The exceptional sensitivity of AMS for detection of carbon-14 and tritium confers great value on the technology for investigations of pharmacokinetics, metabolic profiling, mass balance, toxicology and other biotracer studies. Implementation of AMS in these fields has been impeded by the relatively low throughput of conventional sample preparation methods, which were originally developed for high-precision analysis of sub-Modern samples. Virtually without exception, biotracer studies using live subjects generate super-Modern samples. This reality suggests that reasonable sacrifices in sensitivity and precision that would accompany both shorter AMS analysis times, and faster and less expensive methods of sample preparation, would greatly facilitate widespread application of AMS in tracer-oriented biosciences. Research at the MIT BEAMS Lab has been directed toward creating front-ends for an AMS instrument that convert sample carbon and hydrogen to CO2 and H2, respectively, as a means of rapid and efficient sample processing and transport. Currently three different front-ends, or interfaces, have been developed, giving our laboratory multiple capabilities for handling volatile samples as well as samples present in solution. These include a combustion reactor that oxidizes volatile compounds eluting from a gas chromatograph, and a reduction reactor that produces H2 from organic compounds present in a gas or liquid stream. This presentation will focus on the third interface, one that combusts solution samples to CO2. In contrast to the first two, this interface, rather than accepting a continuous flow, processes individual samples successively. The current design permits analysis of samples at the rate of one/minute. This interface has been evaluated using a variety of different samples generated in several model ADMET studies, including pharmacokinetics of acetaminophen in the rat, HPLC analysis of in vivo acetaminophen metabolites and in vitro testosterone metabolites, drug-DNA interactions in cells in culture and in orthotopic tumor models, and carcinogen-DNA binding in cultured cells. Limits of detection of 0.5 attomoles and five times Modern for low isotope ratio samples are typically achievable using this interface in combination with our AMS instrument.
See more of AMS in Low Dose Bioscience Workshop
See more of The 10th International Conference on Accelerator Mass Spectrometry (September 5-10, 2005)