Kittiporn Laosangthum. Determination of methionine, cysteine and homocysteine in plasma by gas chromatography . Master's Degree(Applied Analytical and Inorganic Chemistry). Mahidol University. : Mahidol University, 2004.
Determination of methionine, cysteine and homocysteine in plasma by gas chromatography
Abstract:
In this study, an analytical method for determination of methionine (Met)
Cysteine (Cys) and homocysteine (Hcy) in plasma samples by gas chromatography
with flame ionization detection (GC-FID) was developed. Plasma was initially treated
with dithiothreitol (DTT) to reduce the disulfide bonds. Liberated thiols were
protected against autoxidation with dilute hydrochloric acid and protein removal was
achieved by ultrafiltration through Microcon-30 membrane. Amino acids in
ultrafiltrate were derivatized with N-methyl-N-trimethylsilyl trifluoroacetamide
(MSTFA) to yield N(O,S)-trimethylsilyl derivatives. Norleucine was used as an
internal standard. The advantage of this method is that no tedious clean-up step is
required during sample preparation and no extraction step is required for GC analysis.
The trimethylsilyl derivative of amino acid was directly measured by GC-FID using
HP-5 column. The calibration curves were linear over the range of 15-73 μM for Met,
154-770 μM for Cys and 6-107 μM for Hcy. The detection limits were 0.7 μM, 1.9 μM
and 1.9 μM for Met, Cys and Hcy respectively. The percent recoveries of Met Cys
and Hcy added to plasma samples were 97-100% for Met, 109-110% for Cys and 90-
103% for Hcy.
The method was applied for the determination of Met, Cys and Hcy in human
plasma samples from twenty healthy adults.