Nicoya Lifesciences is launching FastHDX, a new, hydrogen-deuterium exchange mass spectrometry (HDX-MS) platform designed to measure protein structural dynamics. The company says the platform is the first that can observe such conformational changes at millisecond resolution.

This four- to five-fold order-of-magnitude improvement in labeling resolution can enable direct interrogation of transient states inaccessible with conventional techniques. Nicoya says early adopters, including pharmaceutical and academic institutions, have validated FastHDX in disease-relevant systems (diabetes, cancer, Parkinson’s disease).

How Nicoya Platform Changes the Game

In a press release, Nicoya explained that structural biology approaches tend to focus on stable, folded proteins. However, increasingly, things like intrinsic disorder, weak interactions, and dynamic allosteric coupling are identifying disease-relevant targets. These “populate transient conformational states that mediate low-affinity fragment binding and early regulatory events,” but are difficult to interrogate conventionally.

Specifically, intrinsically disordered proteins and regions comprise one-third of eukaryotic proteins; they play critical roles in cancer and neurological disorders.

According to Nicoya, the millisecond-resolved HDX-MS provided by FastHDX facilitates a “direct experimental window” into these transient states.

Mass Spectrometry Technology Evolves

Nicoya CEO Ryan Denomme said the technology would not be possible without Applied Photophysics, which Nicoya acquired in June 2025.

“FastHDX is the culmination of nearly a decade of development by the Applied Photophysics team,” Denomme said. He added that team used its “deep external expertise and years of iteration with early alpha users.”

Denomme conceded that HDX-MS has existed in some specialized academic settings in the past.

However, “FastHDX is the first commercially available platform built to be robust, automated, and ready for real-world discovery workflows.”

To that end, another advantage of FastHDX that Nicoya touts is its “seamless integration” with liquid chromatography–MS systems. This, the company says, enables adoption of the new platform without disturbing existing MS infrastructure or necessitating retraining.