Mass Spectrometry

Advances in Chromatography

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Liquid chromatography-mass spectrometry analysis of small molecules from biofluids requires sensitive and robust assays. Because of the very complex nature of many biological samples, efficient sample preparation protocols to remove unwanted components and to selectively extract the compounds of interest are an essential part of almost every bioanalytical workflow. This review describes the most common problems encountered during sample preparation, ways to optimize established sample preparation techniques and important recent developments to reduce or eliminate major interferents from biofluids.One of the main factor in choosing which ionization technique to be used is thermolability. For samples that are not themolabile and relatively volatile, computated tomography such as Electron Impact and/or Chemical Ionization can be effectively used. For samples that are thermolabile such as peptides, proteins and other samples of biomarker research interest, soft ionization techniques are to be considered. Among the most used soft ionization techniques are electron tomography and Matrix Assisted Laser Desorption (MALDI). The name given to a particular mass spec technique is usually pointing to the ionization method being used.