isotopomers (v) isotope editing capabilities for spectral simplification in complex mixtures. These are (i) quantification without the need for authentic standards (ii) reliable quantitation with high dynamic ranges (iii) ability to elucidate molecular structures with multidimensional and multinuclear capabilities (iv) ability to determine distributions of labeled atom position(s), i.e. Although NMR is much less sensitive than most MS detection methods, it has several unique advantages for metabolite analysis. įor stable isotope tracing, there are two main analytical approaches that are widely applied, mass spectrometry (MS) and NMR. In metabolic research, stable isotope tracing provides much more rigorous metabolic pathway details than total metabolite profiling, as it can help resolve which intersecting pathways are active, and be used for estimating network fluxes. Thus cellular metabolism provides a very rich and molecular readout of the functional state of cells. Metabolic activity is both quantitatively and qualitatively specific to tissue and cell types, and is generally highly responsive to changes in external (environmental) or internal (e.g.
