Alongside its new Astral Zoom, Thermo Fisher Scientific also launched the Thermo Scientific Orbitrap Excedion Pro mass spectrometer at ASMS 2025, a system engineered to help researchers tackle the growing complexity and size of modern biotherapeutics. This instrument introduces an extended mass range and novel fragmentation technology to help provide detailed structural data to help ensure these next-generation therapeutics are safe and effective before advancing to clinical studies.
The Excedion Pro builds upon Thermo Fisher’s Orbitrap platform while addressing a common biopharma industry challenge: the shift toward larger, more complex biomolecules including antibody-drug conjugates (ADCs), bispecific antibodies, and oligonucleotide-based therapies used in cell and gene treatment approaches. “But really the industry is pushing to expand, and by this, we mean they’re making molecules which are larger, and so we need to be able to see more of these molecules and be able to break them apart so we can analyze them to ensure that they’re safe and effective. And that’s what the Orbitrap Excedion Pro is designed to do,” stated Aaron Robitaille, Director of Marketing, Mass Spectrometry at Thermo Fisher Scientific. One technology underscoring this capability is the Excedion Pro’s EASY-ETD (Electron-Transfer Dissociation) fragmentation, which provides alternative pathways for breaking apart and analyzing these intricate molecular structures.
“It has a larger mass range and alternative fragmentation, which is called EASY-ETD (Electron-Transfer Dissociation), that enables us now to not just focus on traditional monoclonal antibodies, but move into these expanded new modalities, where we have monoclonal antibodies both coupled to other small molecule drugs or coupled to oligonucleotides, or even analyzing the oligonucleotides that are used in cell and gene therapy as an example,” Robitaille explained.
Beyond the instrument itself, Thermo Fisher positions the Excedion Pro as part of a comprehensive “sample to knowledge” workflow platform that integrates sample preparation, detection, and analysis software. This end-to-end approach combines the Excedion Pro with the company’s Vanquish Horizon UHPLC system for separation and BioPharma Finder software for data analysis. “And we provide that end-to-end workflow solution, which is really a differentiator for Thermo Fisher. Not all vendors have this ability to combine sample preparation, detection, and analysis and insight together in a seamless way that helps, again, accelerate the customer time to knowledge,” Robitaille said. The company sees this integrated approach as a way to streamline what can be complex analytical workflows for biopharma researchers working with increasingly sophisticated, and large, therapeutic molecules.
The Excedion Pro’s impact extends beyond traditional biopharma development into emerging research areas such as structural biology and immunopeptidomics. Early research collaborators are already noting its potential in these applications. Dr. Malvina Papanastasiou from the Broad Institute of MIT and Harvard highlighted its value for protein interaction studies. “It enables more comprehensive and precise characterization of protein-ligand and protein-protein interactions,” she stated.
Meanwhile, Dr. Albert Heck from Utrecht University emphasized its capabilities for immunopeptidomics. He noted that “EThcD fragmentation on the Orbitrap Excedion Pro mass spectrometer boosts peptide sequence coverage, minimizing detrimental sequence gaps, even for peptides with unfavorable physicochemical properties.”
