Gas Chromatography Mass Spectrometry Coupling Techniques

Relative to other metabolomics analysis techniques, gas chromatography mass spectrometry (GC/MS) is one of the earliest applied analysis techniques in metabolomics. The first paper on metabolomics (metabolic profiling) is derived from the application of GC/MS analysis in urine and tissue extracts (Dalgliesh et al. 1966). With the arrival of omics era and the proposing of metabolomics concept, people began to try using a variety of analytical techniques to obtain metabolomics data. These techniques include chromatography, capillary electrophoresis, mass spectrometry, nuclear magnetic resonance (NMR), infrared spectroscopy, and electrical chemical methods, etc. GC/MS and NMR are the main technologies applied in the early development of metabolomics; in later stage, high-resolution liquid chromatography mass spectrometry (LC-MS) with fast scanning capability is widely used in metabolomics analysis; in recent years, people began trying to integrate a variety of analytical techniques in order to bring into play the advantage of a variety of methods and to make up for the lack of a single analysis. However, there is no one technology can perform quantitative and qualitative analysis for all the endogenous metabolites in the biological sample. GC/MS is the most mature chromatography mass spectrometry coupling technology, suitable for the analysis of metabolites with low polarity, low boiling point, or volatile after being derivatized. GC/MS has been one of the main analytical platforms in plant metabolomics due to the high resolution, high sensitivity, good reproducibility, a large number of standard metabolite spectra libraries, and the relative low cost. This chapter introduces the GC/MS technology principle, plant metabolite extraction and pretreatment technologies, main problems of GC/MS in plant metabolomics analysis, notes, as well as the latest developments.