title: Ion-pairing reversed-phase liquid chromatography/electrospray ionization mass spectrometric analysis of 76 underivatized amino acids of biological interest: a new tool for the diagnosis of inherited disorders of amino acid metabolism.
abstract: Seventy-six molecules of biological interest for the diagnosis of inherited disorders of amino acids (AA) metabolism have previously been demonstrated to be detectable in electrospray ionization tandem mass spectrometry (ESI-MS/MS) positive mode without derivatization. Reversed-phase liquid chromatography (RPLC) separation on different C18 columns using various perfluorinated carboxylic acids as ion-pairing agents has been found suitable for coupling with MS/MS, and for the separation of AA. A new procedure was optimized in order to replace the usual ion-exchange chromatographic, post-column ninhydrin derivatization, time-consuming routine method. This procedure allowed an adequate separation of all the molecules from other known interfering compounds, and a throughput of two samples per hour. Quantification limits for each molecule were found to be compatible with their measurement in plasma and urine. We validated the qualitative part of the method by analyzing plasma and urine samples from patients affected with several inherited disorders of AA metabolism. We validated the quantification of 16 AA using their stable isotopes as internal standard. The calibration curves were linear over the range 0-3 mM. The quantitative results obtained with the new method on 105 plasma and 99 urine samples were in good agreement with those obtained by the established routine method. Spiking experiments and precision results were also satisfactory.
authors.affiliation: Service de Biochimie Pédiatrique, Hôpital Debrousse, 29 rue Soeur Bouvier, 69322 Lyon cedex 05, France. monique.piraud@chu-lyon.fr
authors.forename: Monique
authors.initials: M
authors.lastname: Piraud
authors.forename: Christine
authors.initials: C
authors.lastname: Vianey-Saban
authors.forename: Konstantinos
authors.initials: K
authors.lastname: Petritis
authors.forename: Claire
authors.initials: C
authors.lastname: Elfakir
authors.forename: Jean-Paul
authors.initials: JP
authors.lastname: Steghens
authors.forename: Denis
authors.initials: D
authors.lastname: Bouchu
mesh_terms: D000592:Amino Acid Metabolism, Inborn Errors / Q000175:diagnosis* / Q000378:metabolism*; D000596:Amino Acids / Q000097:blood* / Q000652:urine*; D006801:Humans; D015203:Reproducibility of Results; D021241:Spectrometry, Mass, Electrospray Ionization / Q000379:methods*
chemical_list: D000596:Amino Acids