A historic challenge for shotgun proteomics has been the requirement for
high quality, simple and nonredundant curated protein sequences in small
.fasta text files. Due to the intrinsic informatic challenges and time
required to assemble these files, proteomics has struggled to expand
beyond the confines of a few model organisms. When considering
post-translational modifications that may or may not be present on a
specific peptide sequence, these factors inevitably compound. A study on
how mangos continue to ripen on the shelf may not be the first thing
you'd think of as proof of a scientific discipline shedding historic
limitations. However, Bautiste-Valle et al., may be just that. These
authors present a quantitative comparison of both peptide and
glycopeptide alterations through the complexity of the fruit ripening
process and in this we see the present state of a field that no longer
needs to wait on genomics to obtain deep mechanistic insights.