Consent Preferences
Skip to content
Back to Core Facilites Exchange

Metabolomics and Analytical Chemistry Core

1 of 3 Images

Based in Little Rock, Arkansas, the Metabolomics and Analytical Chemistry Core (MACC) is a premier 2,200-square-foot facility dedicated to the advanced chemical analysis of biological samples and diets. Operating within the Arkansas Children’s Nutrition Center, our laboratory serves as a vital hub for both discovery-based and hypothesis-driven research.

 

We specialize in exploring the complex relationships between diet, exercise, and health, with a particular focus on maternal, infant, and childhood development. Our core provides comprehensive support for:

-Untargeted Metabolomics & Lipidomics: Broad-scale profiling to discover new biological insights.

-Targeted Assays: Precise quantification of phytochemicals, short-chain fatty acids (SCFAs), bile acids, amino acids, and more.

-Diverse Sample Analysis: Expertise in processing plasma, serum, urine, tissues, milk, and food matrices.

 

Directed by Colin Kay, Ph.D. (Scientific Director) and Renny Lan, Ph.D. (Operations Director), our team of expert chemists and researchers has supported more than 50 investigators over the past five years. While our primary mission is to serve the USDA-ARS, ACRI, and UAMS, we actively welcome collaborations and testing agreements with external universities and institutes.

 

To ensure the highest level of data annotation and accuracy, we utilize an in-house spectral library of 700 standard compounds, primarily focused on phytochemicals and microbiome-related metabolites, alongside global spectral libraries like mzCloud, NIST and GNPS. In close partnership with the Biostatistics and Data Innovation Core, we provide seamless, large-scale data processing to turn complex chemical signals into meaningful scientific discoveries.

If you’re interested in accessing this facility, you may qualify for a voucher to cover facility costs. Visit Research Vouchers – Arkansas INBRE to check your project’s eligibility.

Available Equipment

Rates are tailored based on the funding source, the participating institution, and the total sample volume. The rate will be generated once the user input their information in iLab.

    Thermo Exploris 480 Orbitrap MS (metabolomics)

    • This is an most updated mass spectrometer with the highest resolution (480K) for quantitative and qualitative analysis. Instead of the traditional data dependent acquisition (DDA), Exlporis 480 instrumentation uses AcquireX data acquisition to increase the quantification of low abundant metabolites and reduce the noise background. The raw data is also processed by the Thermo Compound Discoverer.
    • The system is currently serve for untargeted or semi-targeted metabolomics analysis.

    Thermo Exploris 480 Orbitrap MS (lipidomics)

    • This is an orbitrap mass spectrometer system that provides high sensitivity and high mass resolution for quantitative and qualitative analysis.  It can be configured with a Vanquish UHPLC chromatography system to acquire raw spectral data through DDA. The raw data is processed by the Thermo Compound Discoverer, MS-DIAL and Lipid Search Software.
    • The system is mainly used for untargeted lipidomics analysis.

    Sciex 7500 Triple Quadrupole MS

    • A quantitative dietary phytochemical metabolite profiling workflow utilizing a SCIEX 7500 enhanced high performance hybrid triple quadrupole MS, the Cores primary tool for targeted quantitative metabolite profiling and having MS(n) data capture, the system is capable of fragmentation profiling, isotope pattern verification, and targeted and untargeted scanning, affording the elucidation of both known and novel structures.

    Waters Xevo TQ-S micro Triple Quadrupole MS

    • This is a high performance mass spectrometer from a compact design with rapid, reliable and reproducible quantitative data. Revolutionary design has produced a tandem quadrupole instrument with a small footprint that delivers consistent low levels of quantitation with a wide dynamic range. It’s robust performance to build MRM methods for different assays including amino acids, short chain fatty acids, acylcartines, tryptophan metabolism and many phytochemicals.
    • The instrument can be used to test the hypothesis from clinical samples or validate the metabolite IDs from untargeted metabolomics platforms.

    Waters PDa/QDa MS

    • This Waters ACQUITY QDa Detector is a robust single quadrupole mass detector integrated with ACQUITY UPLC and a photodiode Array Detector (PDa) which provide complementary information for compound identification and quantification.
    • The system is currently used for quantification of phytochemicals.

    Waters Select Cyclic Ion Mobility ToF MS

    • This is a unique instrument that adds a cyclic ion mobility separator between the quadrupole and time of flight mass analyzers.  The instrument can separate ions based on their shape which is particularly valuable for analysis of lipids which exist as multiple isobaric species. The instrument is interfaced with a Waters Premier UHPLC system running Masslynx software for instrument control and data acquisition. The raw data can be processed by UNIFI for targeted analysis or Progenesis QI for untargeted approach.

    Thermo Q-Exactive orbitrap MS

    • This is an orbitrap mass spectrometer system that provides high sensitivity and high mass resolution for quantitative and qualitative analysis. It can be configured with a Vanquish UHPLC chromatography system to acquire raw spectral data through PRM used in a tartgeted manner. The data will be processed by TraceFinder software. The platform currently serve for Bile Acid assay.