Anew Matrix Ti-CAandits Applicationfor The Determination Of Small Biological Molecules

MALDI-TOF-MS based on commercial matrix was mainly used for analyzing large molecular weight compounds. It was difficult to analyze low molecular weight compounds (<1,000m/z) because the organic matrices that allowed MALDI to work interferes in this mass range.In the last decade, nano materials were used as MALDI matrices to overcome their shortcomings. As the surface effect, small-size effect and the quantum effect, nano materials got special thermal and optical properties, and could not "fly" in TOF-MS. This could suppress interferes in this mass range. But pure nano materials were not suit for matrices, low signal intensities, weak reproducibilities and accumulations in solution effected their use.According to the latest report, nano TiO2could be used as matrix. But we found that commercially available nano TiO2failed to work well. The signal intensities were low and the reproducibility was poor, probably because the formation of secondary particles diminish weakened the nanometer size effect.In this paper, we established a simple surface pretreatment process based on commercially available nano TiO2to produce a cheap, stable, non-toxic, fruitful new matrix Ti-CA. Based on this we discussed the determination and analysis of small biological molecules about metabonomics using MALDI-TOF-MS. The results were as follows:1. As a matrix, Ti-CA overcomed the interference in low mass range caused by organic matrices, and maked up the shortfall of commercially available nano TiO2about signal intensities and reproducibility.2. Under these optimization conditions, the LODs of L-Phenylalanine and D-ribose were low (1pmol and0.5pmol respectively), and the reproducibilities were high (15.0%and20.4%respectively, under10pmol)..3. This technique was successfully applied to the analysis of various types of small molecules, such as amino acids, saccharides, amines and small peptides under10-5mol/L concentration.4. This technique was applied to the analysis of energy drinks, taurine, the main ingredients were successfully detected.