Pinsen Medical Joins China's 14th Five-Year National Key R&D Program to Advance Domestic Mass Spectrometry Innovation
Recently, the National Key R&D Program of China’s 14th Five-Year Plan—specifically the key special project on “Frontier Biotechnologies” titled “Research and Development of Key Technologies for High-Precision, High-Throughput Biomolecular Analysis and Tandem Mass Spectrometry Instruments”—was officially launched. Led by the Dalian Institute of Chemical Physics, Chinese Academy of Sciences, the project involves collaborative efforts from eight institutions, including Pingsheng Medical, Dalian University of Technology, Tianjin University, Dalian University, the First Affiliated Hospital of Harbin Medical University, the First Medical Center of the Chinese PLA General Hospital, and Peking University Third Hospital. This initiative fosters deep integration among industry, academia, research, and clinical sectors to accelerate the domestic production of high-end mass spectrometry equipment and related core technologies. Pingsheng Medical is the sole industrial partner participating in this research endeavor.
Currently, China is at a critical juncture in the new round of scientific and industrial revolution. Competition for the commanding heights of science and technology is fierce. It is imperative to accelerate the remediation of shortcomings in China’s high-end medical equipment, intensify breakthroughs in key core technologies, and achieve self-reliance and controllability in high-end medical equipment. Driven by policies supporting domestically produced equipment, China’s high-end medical equipment sector is rising rapidly, fostering deep integration between the industrial chain and the innovation chain. Promoting the decentralization of high-quality medical resources and ensuring equitable access to technology are urgent requirements for comprehensively advancing the Healthy China initiative.
Mass spectrometry has emerged as a new direction in precision medicine, leveraging advantages such as high specificity, high sensitivity, and multi-analyte detection. However, constrained by significant technical barriers, high-end mass spectrometry equipment has long faced critical supply chain bottlenecks. The relatively low rate of domestic substitution and the prohibitive costs have limited the widespread clinical adoption of mass spectrometry technology.
According to the introduction, this key special project will focus on the clinical needs for high-end mass spectrometers, providing fully independent intellectual property rights and complete solutions ranging from mass spectrometry equipment to supporting protocols. The project will develop high-resolution, high-throughput tandem mass spectrometry devices with independent intellectual property rights, along with associated methods, offering comprehensive solutions for the rapid qualitative identification and precise quantitative analysis of biomolecules, thereby enhancing China’s independent R&D capabilities for high-performance biological mass spectrometry instruments. By leveraging the respective strengths of participating institutions in hardware development, clinical applications, and frontier omics research, the project aims to create fully domestically produced high-end clinical mass spectrometry equipment, fill technological gaps in this field, and provide original technical support for the development of clinical mass spectrometry and multi-omics precision diagnosis and treatment in China.
Cheng Xiaoliang, Founder, Chairman, and CEO of Pingsheng Medical, stated: “Since its inception, Pingsheng Medical has remained committed to independent innovation, collaborating with innovative forces across various sectors to fully promote the self-controllability and accessibility of China’s high-end mass spectrometry equipment throughout the entire industrial chain, thereby continuously driving the industry toward higher-dimensional development. Being the sole clinical mass spectrometry enterprise entrusted with the R&D special project for tandem mass spectrometry instruments under the 14th Five-Year Plan is both a testament to Pingsheng’s capabilities and a great honor for the company. Over the next five years, we will dedicate substantial R&D resources, work hand in hand with partners across the upstream and downstream industrial chains, target the forefront of high-end mass spectrometry technology, and make every effort to achieve breakthroughs in core key technologies.”
In the future, Pingsheng Medical will launch more cost-effective high-end domestically produced mass spectrometry equipment, promoting the intelligence, miniaturization, scenario-specific adaptation, and platform-based development of such devices. It aims to resolve compatibility issues between instruments and reagents, and drive the integration of diagnosis and treatment as well as seamless translation from research to clinical practice through collaborative innovation among industry, academia, research institutions, and healthcare providers. These efforts will make greater contributions to reducing healthcare costs and improving the quality of medical and health services in China.
