Comprehensive Profiling by Non-targeted Stable Isotope Tracing Capillary Electrophoresis-Mass Spectrometry: A New Tool Complementing Metabolomic Analyses of Polar Metabolites

Mass spectrometry (MS) driven metabolomics is a frequently used tool in various areas of life sciences; however, the analysis of polar metabolites is less commonly included. In general, metabolomic analyses lead to the detection of the total amount of all covered metabolites. This is currently a major limitation with respect to metabolites showing high turnover rates, but no changes in their concentration. Such metabolites and pathways could be crucial metabolic nodes (e.g., potential drug targets in cancer metabolism). A stable-isotope tracing capillary electrophoresis–mass spectrometry (CE-MS) metabolomic approach was developed to cover both polar metabolites and isotopologues in a non-targeted way. An in-house developed software enables high throughput processing of complex multidimensional data. The practicability is demonstrated analyzing [U-¹³C]-glucose exposed prostate cancer and non-cancer cells. This CE-MS-driven analytical strategy complements polar metabolite profiles through isotopologue labeling patterns, thereby improving not only the metabolomic coverage, but also the understanding of metabolism.     

Fluorescent-based single-strand conformation polymorphism/heteroduplex capillary electrophoretic mutation analysis of the P53 gene.

Fluorescent-based single-strand conformation polymorphism (F-SSCP) analysis with capillary electrophoresis (CE) is the most common method for the detection of mutation because of its high sensitivity and resolution. In this study, we prepared an inexpensive linear polyacrylamide (LPA), and successfully applied it to CE-SSCP analysis and tandem CE-SSCP/heteroduplex analysis (HA) of the P53 gene on an ABI capillary genetic analyzer. A comparison of the sieving capabilities of a homemade LPA and commercial polydimethylacrylamide (PDMA) demonstrates that the homemade LPA has a higher resolution, a shorter analysis time, and is more suitable for tandem SSCP/HA than commercial PDMA. To show the usefulness, mutations of P53 gene exon 7 - 8 in 37 tumor samples were investigated by using homemade LPA. The results indicate that 10 mutations were found in 9 of 37 cases; the majority of P53 mutations were missense mutations, and 70% were located in exon 7, which plays an important role in neoplastic progression in human tumorigenesis.     

Study of the reactions and reaction mechanisms of phosphine (Ph3P) and of phosphite ((PhO)3P) with sulphur (S8)

The reactions of sulphur with phosphine and phosphite were investigated by low-energy electron impact mass spectrometry and fast atom bombardment mass spectrometry. A previously reported mechanism of the Ph₃P–S₈ reaction was supported and a possible mechanism for the (PhO)₃P–S₈ reaction is proposed.     

不依赖于统计模型的手性毛细管电泳分离多指标同时优化

考虑到手性毛细管电泳分离机理的复杂性，提出了不依赖于统计模型的二进制编码遗传算法多目标优化策略。根据实验参数的多少及其重要性，采用均匀设计安排完成初步实验。并用Derringer功效函数作为多指标同时优化的评价指标，以取得较高的分离度和较快分离速度；通过对实验参数给予编码，转化为二进制字符串，根据得到的总功效函数值大小进行遗传算法操作，产生新的一组实验条件。重复上述过程直到得到最佳分离条件为止。此方法成功地应用于华法令对映体的毛细管电泳分离条件优化。     

Analysis of volatile organic compounds in human urine by headspace gas chromatography-mass spectrometry with a multipurpose sampler.

A multipurpose sampler (Gerstel MPS), designed for liquid large volume, gaseous and headspace samples was used for the GC-MS analysis of organic volatiles in human urine. Headspace sampling with a volume-, temperature- and speed-controlled gas-tight syringe was combined with a temperature-controlled cold injection system (CIS) for cold trapping, enrichment and focusing of analytes. Regular 2-ml GC vials filled with 1 ml acidified urine were used as headspace sampling vials. A 100-vial autosampler tray was equipped with an additional temperature and heating time controlled "preheating station" for five vials. Profiles of organic volatiles in human urine were determined and 34 components identified. Trimethylamine (TMA) and 4-heptanone as two metabolites of medical interest were quantified. Calibration curves and intra assay imprecision for 4-heptanone concentrations in the range of 40 to 800 ng/ml showed a correlation coefficient of r = 0.9980 and a relative standard deviation (RSD) between 3.0 and 3.4%. Calibration curves and intra-assay imprecision for TMA concentrations in the range of medical interest from 0.5 to 20 micrograms/ml showed a correlation coefficient of r = 0.9968 and a RSD between 4.1 and 6.8%. The high practicability of the multipurpose sampler for both gaseous and liquid samples together with the here shown good reproducibility and sensitivity make this single CIS-GC-MS system very attractive for routine clinical use in metabolic profiling of organic volatiles (headspace) and non-volatiles (liquid).     

Sample preparation for organic acids in biological fluids

A review of sample preparation methods for organic acids in biological fluids, in particular serum and urine, is presented. It covers techniques on organic acid determination without sample preparation, release of organic acids from binding locations, removal of proteins by protein precipitation and ultrafiltration, isolation of the organic acids by liquid-liquid and liquid-solid extraction, purification of the extract, derivatization and pre-fractionation. The various alternative sample preparation steps are compared and critically discussed. Examples of applications including profile analysis of organic acids by gas chromatography (GC), determination of particular organic acids by GC or liquid chromatography and determination of fatty acids as a distinct chemical class of acids demonstrate that the kind of sample preparation chosen depends strongly on the analytical aims.     

Applications of homemade kit in mutation detection of genes

With the accomplishment of Human Genome Project (HGP), single nucleotide polymorphism (SNP) and mutation detection in human genome are becom-ing a new researching focus. These researches can help us to understand the phenotype diversity of indi-vidual, disease susceptibility and drug resistance of different colonies. Traditional method used for muta-tion detection is slab gel electrophoresis, which re-mains labor-intensive and time-consuming because of the requirement of radioactivity or te…     

Multivariate comparison of concentration profiles in materials analysis

Hierarchical cluster analysis (HCA) and principal components analysis (PCA) were applied to find groups between similar depth-profiles in thin-layers investigated by Rutherford backscattering spectrometry (RBS).HCA yields in one run an objective hierarchy of similarity for several profiles. Among the similarity coefficients examined the linear measure, the Euclidean distance and the exponential measure respond with different sensitivity to overall shifts in direction of the concentration axis, whereas the correlation measure relates to parallelism of the profiles.For agglomerative HCA with Euclidean distance, a lowest significant linkage level has been defined by use of Fisher'sF-test. For divisive HCA based also on Euclidean distance, the maximum of a separating function marks the most separating cluster step. The outcomes of both proposals agree for the data set investigated.PCA is useful for verifying the results of HCA and yields additional information about the data structure. In the actual example quite different positions of features (concentrations at definite depths) in the space of the two first principal components hint at peculiarities during the metallurgical coating process.     

新型微填充柱－毛细管柱二维色谱系统过程的动力学研究

从色谱动力学角度对新型微填充柱－毛细管柱二维色谱系统过程中双柱条件与流出曲线及柱效之间的依赖关系加以系统研究。结果表明：由于双柱条件之间存在关联，双柱系统流出曲线特征与单柱系统存在一定的差异，流出曲线一阶矩和二、三阶中心矩以及双柱系统的柱效皆由预柱和主柱条件综合确定。