Analysis of small metabolites using novel alloy nanoparticles

We demonstrated a laser desorption/ionization mass spectrometry (LDI MS) based metabolite detection method using Au/Pd alloy nanocrystals as novel matrix. A sensitive LDI performance for detection of standard small molecules and metabolic analysis of serum samples was achieved owing to the unique structural feature of the alloy. Our approach offered facile sample preparation within minutes and low sample consumption down to ~10 nL for practical application. This work shed light on material based LDI MS analysis of small molecular weight metabolites using designed diagnostic tools.