The National Cancer Institute's Center for Cancer Research in Bethesda, US, has purchased Acquity UPLC MS systems from Waters Corporation for its metabolomics research programs.
The research is aimed at discovering small molecule metabolites, or biomarkers, associated with cancer susceptibility and diagnosis, treatment efficacy and the adverse effects of medicines and other chemicals.
Researchers believe these tools will lead to a better understanding of the mechanisms of the disease and its diagnosis, treatment and prevention.
Identifying and quantifying the thousands of metabolic biomarkers present in a complex sample such as urine can be a daunting task.
Only with the most sensitive of instruments and most powerful of software can researchers uncover and pinpoint the important biomarkers that may be present even in the smallest of quantities.
This level of advanced research requires analytical tools with exceptional separations and confirmatory power, and the speed and reliability to analyse thousands of samples per month.
Since purchasing an Acquity UPLC/Q-Tof Premier mass spectrometer in 2005, the Center has tested 80,000 samples using this system in support of various research studies.
The Waters Acquity UPLC system employs 1.7 micron particles in analytical columns that permit higher chromatographic resolution, shorter analysis times and the use of less solvent per sample.
Paired with tandem quadrupole and quadrupole time-of-flight/ion mobility mass spectrometry, the sharper chromatographic peaks, increased peak heights, and better signal-to-noise performance of UPLC technology improves the mass spectrometer's ability to ionise molecules.
This capability leads to greater all-around MS sensitivity and the ability to accurately identify small concentrations of individual analytes.
UPLC separations typically take only 10 minutes versus nearly 50 minutes for traditional HPLC to get the same answer, leading to better throughput.
UPLC consumes up to 95 per cent less solvent than HPLC, a major consideration given the current shortage and rising cost of acetonitrile and the amount of solvent that metabolomics studies consume.
Waters Xevo TQ MS system is an advanced tandem quadrupole mass spectrometer that tackles demanding quantification applications for target compounds at low concentrations in complex and diverse samples.
The Xevo TQ MS system uses Scanwave, a collision cell technology based on the use of Waters' T-Wave technology, which is claimed to improve duty cycle and enhance the full scan capability.
This allows scientists to confirm the identities and structures of targeted analytes.
The Synapt HDMS system combines quadrupole time-of-flight with ion-mobility technology and software to enable the analysis of sample ions differentiated by size and shape, as well as mass.
This additional dimension of separations fidelity leads to improved specificity and sample definition, meaning scientists can extract more information about their samples and detect previously unseen constituents.
Together with bioinformatics software tools incorporated in Waters Masslynx software, researchers using UPLC/MS/MS can analyse tens of thousands of data points per analysis, ultimately creating a more informed picture of the mechanisms of toxicity and carcinogenicity in human patients.
