Highly sensitive quantification of key regulatory oxysterols in biological samples by LC-ESI-MS/MS

We describe a highly sensitive and specific method for the quantification of key regulatory oxysterols in biological samples. This method is based upon a stable isotope dilution technique by liquid chromatography-tandem mass spectrometry (LC-MS/MS). After alkaline hydrolysis of human serum (5 mu l) or rat liver microsomes (1 mg protein), oxysterols were extracted, derivatized into picolinyl esters, and analyzed by LC-MS/MS using the electrospray ionization mode. The detection limits of the picolinyl esters of 4 beta-hydroxycholesterol, 7 alpha-hydroxycholesterol, 22R-hydroxycholesterol, 24S-hydroxycholesterol, 25-hydroxycholesterol, 27-hydroxycholesterol, and 24S, 25-epoxycholesterol were 2-10 fg (5-25 amol) on-column (signal-to-noise ratio = 3). Reproducibilities and recoveries of these oxysterols were validated according to one-way layout and polynomial equation, respectively. The variances between sample preparations and between measurements by this method were calculated to be 1.8% to 12.7% and 2.9% to 11.9%, respectively. The recovery experiments were performed using rat liver microsomes spiked with 0.05 ng to 12 ng of oxysterols, and recoveries of the oxysterols ranged from 86.7% to 107.3%, with a mean recovery of 100.6%. This method provides reproducible and reliable results for the quantification of oxysterols in small amounts of biological samples. Honda, A., K. Yamashita, T. Hara, T. Ikegami, T. Miyazaki, M. Shirai, G. Xu, M. Numazawa, and Y. Matsuzaki. Highly sensitive quantification of key regulatory oxysterols in biological samples by LC-ESI-MS/MS. J. Lipid Res. 2009. 50: 350-357.