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certainly promote labs into investing serious amounts of money into a metabolomics programme. This is a bandwagon that cannot be stopped.


The -omic is going global and no clear guidelines are defined for people to use. We have read several manuscripts in high impact factor journals - higher than the highest analytical chemistry journal – with inconsistencies. These include markers being identified in the void of a chromatogram, standard errors of identified compounds which are too small, for example can the variation of a metabolite in a biofluid be less than the variation of an analytical method with LC-MS? We have seen molecule identifications which are plausible from a biological point of view but do not follow fundamental laws of chromatography. Not to mention manuscripts where the statistics and modeling have completely hidden the quality of the raw data.


Biomarkers are found in several correlation- causation studies, but translation to the real world will take time. LC-MS metabolomics is not that easy. It is not that difficult either; a comment we overheard by a pioneer of separation science while at a dinner at the Royal Society – “Metabolomics? You look at metabolite profiles after a drug has been given to someone?”…yes, that is one of the applications, in fact one that is relatively easy and gives excellent results.


There is no doubt in our mind that any experienced separation scientist would have an advantage on the acquisition of metabolomic data, understanding the data, its accuracy, its limitations and how sometimes, even if your MS accuracy is sub-ppm the molecule cannot be identified.


Therefore, we foresee a time when separation scientists combine efforts and achieve the rapid analysis of hundreds of thousands of


metabolites in a biofluid, tissue, etc- a new age in healthcare will unravel. Computers already handle this amount of information and statistics will certainly become better at facing uncertainty. Quite how we will achieve the separation of 1 million molecules in one go is something that remains to be seen.


References [1] A Long Journey from Capillary Gas Chromatography to the World of Glycomes and Proteomes, Desty Memorial Lecture, 6th October 2010 Royal Institution,London, UK


[2] Nicholson JK, Lindon JC, Holmes E. 1999. Xenobiotica. 29 (11): 1181–9


[3)].Ott MA and Vriend G. 2006. BMC Bioinformatics. 7: 517 [4] Xiayan L, Legido-Quigley C. 2008. Electrophoresis. 29 (18): 3724-36


[5]., Zhao C, Lu G, Xu GJ. 2008. J Chromatogr B. 866 (1-2): 64-76


[6] Wu ZM, Huang ZQ, Lehmann R, et al. 2009. Chromatographia. 69: 23-32


[7]. Dunn WB. 2008. Phys. Biol. 5: 1 [8] Boccard J, Veuthey JL, Rudaz S. 2010. J. Sep. Sci. 33 (3): 290-304


Agilent Expands LC/MS Portfolio with Ion Trap Mass Spectrometry


Agilent Technologies introduce the Agilent 500 Ion Trap LC/MS, an affordable and accurate MS/MS solution for chemical analysis, food- and product-safety testing, and other industrial applications.


The 500 Ion Trap LC/MS is a robust and reliable analytical instrument that offers routine, affordable MS, MS/MS, and MSn capabilities. The system can be ordered and operated with the complete line of Agilent LC products. With the choice of many ionization modes and scanning techniques the new 500 Ion Trap is a flexible system that can screen, identify and confirm compounds in a single experiment.


"The 500 Ion Trap LC/MS system fits perfectly into the Agilent LC/MS product portfolio,” said Ken Miller, Agilent marketing director, LC/MS Division. “It offers the flexibility of routine, affordable compound identification and quantification that is ideal for many labs."


The Agilent 500 Ion Trap LC/MS joins a strong portfolio of LC/MS instruments. Earlier this year, Agilent introduced the 6490 Triple Quadrupole LC/MS System with iFunnel technology. iFunnel technology revolutionizes the process of atmospheric pressure ion sampling, driving huge sensitivity gains for most applications.


For more information visit www.agilent.com do you have a New Product...?


If you would like to include your product information in the next issue, please send your details to marcus@intlabmate.com.


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