Proteomic-based biomarker discovery approaches broadly attempt to identify proteins whose basal abundance, or change in abundance in response to a perturbation (e.g., a therapeutic intervention) is able to discriminate between populations of patients. Up until recently, the majority of approaches for discovering circulating biomarkers have focused on directly profiling serum or plasma to identify such proteins. However, the complexity and dynamic range of protein abundance in serum and plasma create a significant challenge for proteomics methods. To overcome these barriers, diverse approaches to simplify or to fractionate serum and plasma have been developed. For some diseases, such as those related to specific organs, there may be useful marker proteins that originate in the organ. Here, we describe an approach for marker discovery that focuses on the profiling of either primary tissue or cell culture models thereof.