Five Thoughts on Making Personalized Medicine a Reality

Juergen Popp

I am absolutely convinced that analytical science can make personalized medicine reality. In this context, I would like to mention an example from our research here in Jena.

Let's assume the following situation: A patient is at the doctor's and after a brief medical history, the doctor decides that it is a bacterial infection and prescribes a specific antibiotic. The question now arises as to how the doctor knows that it is a bacterial infection and not a fungal or viral infection, or, if it really is a bacterial infection, that the bacteria causing it are not resistant to the prescribed antibiotic. It would be very advantageous here if, before prescribing an antibiotic or taking an antibiotic, a precise personalized diagnosis could be made in the sense of a rapid identification of the pathogen (virus, fungus or bacterium) and a characterization of its resistance profile if it is a bacterial infection, which would then be followed by targeted personalized therapy. 

In recent years, we have shown that biophotonics such as Raman spectroscopy offers great potential for personalized management of infections, i.e. for understanding the immune response, rapidly identifying the pathogen responsible for the infection and its resistance profile and evaluating the success of treatment. In this context, the application of Raman spectroscopy in combination with advanced AI-based spectral analysis is proving to be crucial for overcoming these challenges. The integration of Raman spectroscopy into point-of-care approaches encompasses the entire diagnostic process - from sample collection to the provision of final diagnostic results. In my opinion, our work on Raman spectroscopy for infectious diagnosis is a perfect example of how analytical spectroscopy provides solutions for clinical diagnostic applications for timely personalized therapy.

Albert Heck

In the short term analytical science could be used to much better monitor drug effects and optimize doses/treatments, thereby avoiding the misuse of drugs and adverse effects.

Robert Kennedy

I don't think personalized medicine will happen without analytical measurements at multiple levels. First, you need better analytics to identify the biomarkers of interest. Then, you need routine assays to determine what personalized medicine is needed. Then, you need assays to track the performance of the assay. Making all of this faster and cheaper (to avoid runaway healthcare costs) is required to make it a reality.

Ying Ge

Analytical science, especially mass spectrometry-based proteomics, can decode individual molecular signatures, enabling personalized medicine by tailoring treatments to each patient’s unique biological profile and monitoring therapeutic efficacy.

Lingjun Li

I believe that with the rapid development of more sensitive and high-resolution and precision measurement tools, analytical science can make personalized medicine a reality. The continued development of advanced analytical tools, especially mass spectrometry-based omics approaches enables high-throughput quantitative measurement of biomolecular features such as proteins, posttranslational modification isoforms, lipids and metabolites and their structural isomers in healthy and diseased conditions. These systems level omics technologies have revolutionized medical research by enabling large-scale studies and revealing individual differences, thus leading to more precise clinical diagnosis and personalized medicine and individualized treatment.