Onsite fixation preserves phosphoprotein profile in human whole blood

Fixing human whole blood at collection preserves phosphoprotein profiles, retaining stimulation-induced pSTAT3 and other kinase readouts after 6 weeks of storage.

• Why it matters: Phospho-flow measurements are distorted by ex vivo instability and conventional steps like PBMC isolation and cryopreservation, creating delays that can change kinase-pathway activity readouts.
• What they did: The team fixed whole blood at collection and quantified six phosphoproteins by mass cytometry, benchmarking against matched cryopreserved PBMCs and tracking phosphorylation after 6 weeks of storage.
• The result: Whole blood retained neutrophils (~75–80% pSTAT3-positive at baseline) and showed higher monocyte pSTAT3 (~41% vs ~9% in PBMCs), while stimulation patterns persisted after 6 weeks, enabling centralized batch analysis.

AI summary of the abstract · may contain errors · not medical advice · read the paper.