Current and emerging mass-spectrometry technologies for metabolomics

Mass spectrometry (MS) has secured a central role in metabolomics that is predicted to grow based upon continuous developments and improvements in MS technologies. This article reviews both current MS technologies incorporated into many metabolomics programs as well as emerging MS technologies that hold additional promise for the advancement of metabolomics. We discuss examples of metabolic fingerprinting using direct MS analysis of complex mixtures with traditional and emerging ionization sources, spatially resolved metabolite profiling via MS imaging, metabolite profiling using chromatography coupled to MS, multi-dimensional chromatography coupled to MS, and ion-mobility MS. (c) 2008 Published by Elsevier Ltd.