Karl Clauser

Karl Clauser, B.S.

Karl Clauser

Karl Clauser is a principal scientist in the Proteomics Platform at the Broad Institute of MIT and Harvard under the direction of Steven A. Carr. He works on developing and applying LC-MS/MS based proteomic techniques for identification, characterization, and quantitation of proteins and their post-translational modifications (PTMs) in adhesion, signal transduction, biomarker discovery, target validation, and biotherapeutic research paradigms in collaboration with scientists in oncology, neurology, cardiovascular, and inflammation disease areas. As a hands-on scientist at the Broad Institute, his research has focused on extracellular matrix composition and its changes in response to tumor progression and treatment; proteogenomics of human breast cancer; phosphoproteomics to identify signaling pathways modulated by development, disease, or drug action; de novo sequencing of proteins from organisms with unsequenced genomes; and software development.

Clauser originated the Spectrum Mill suite of software tools for high-throughput interpretation of discovery-mode LC-MS/MS datasets to provide protein/peptide/PTM identification and quantitation, and he also contributes to its ongoing development with Broad partner Agilent Technologies Inc. Recent software development efforts have focused on detection of single amino acid variant and splice isoforms; scoring the certainty/ambiguity in modification site localization; relative quantitation from isotope encoding experiments (i.e. iTRAQ/TMT and SILAC); false discovery rate calculation; and quality metrics for measuring performance aspects of mass spectrometry, chromatography, spectral interpretation, and sample handling.

Prior to joining the Broad Institute in 2004, Clauser worked in proteomics groups at Genentech and Millennium Pharmaceuticals, where he applied advanced separations methods, mass spectrometry, and informatics to characterize protein pathways, understand the mechanism of action of drug candidates, define biomarkers of disease and drug effect, and build understanding of protein targets and their roles in disease. As part of his doctoral studies he co-authored Protein Prospector, a widely used proteomics software package accessible freely over the Web. 

Clauser holds a B.S. in chemistry from the California Institute of Technology.

Contact Karl Clauser via email at clauser@broadinstitute.org.

February 2018