Quantitative Analysis of 2D Gels

The use of 2D electrophoresis for comparative proteomics allows the revelation of variations of protein relative amounts according to various physiological or genetic criteria. The statistical significance of these results is related to different factors, from the experimental design to the statistical tests. In this chapter we describe different parameters that should be taken into account in the experimental design and during image acquisition, and we present different programs for the normalization of quantitative data, the selection of reproducible spots according to user-defined criteria, and the selection of spots showing qualitative and significant quantitative variations.