Application of Metabolomics Techniques using LC/MS and GC/MS Profiling Analysis of Green Tea Leaves

Introduction

Metabolomics, or metabolome analysis, refers to the indepth analysis of metabolites in a biological organism, and in recent years has been applied across a wide range of fi elds, including diagnostic biomarker search and etiological analysis in the fi eld of medical treatment, marker search for indications of drug effi cacy and toxicity in the fi eld of drug manufacture, and quality control and quality prediction in the fi eld of food products, to name a few1). A great number of metabolites spanning a wide range of chemical characteristics have become targets for metabolome analysis. For this reason, separation analytical techniques are often used for comprehensive analysis of these substance, with such techniques as gas chromatography-mass spectrometry (GC/MS), liquid chromatography-mass spectrometry (LC/MS), and capillary electrophoresis mass spectrometry being reported. This Application Note presents the profiling of green tea leaves as an example of one application of the metabolome analysis technique using LC/MS and GC/MS. A search of the substances believed to play roles in product quality was conducted, and a quality prediction model was constructed based on the results.

January 18, 2011 GMT