Quantitative hopanoid analysis enables robust pattern detection and comparison between laboratories.

ABSTRACT: Hopanoids are steroid-like lipids from the isoprenoid family that are produced primarily by bacteria. Hopanes, molecular fossils of hopanoids, offer the potential to provide insight into environmental transitions on the early Earth, if their sources and biological functions can be constrained. Semiquantitative methods for mass spectrometric analysis of hopanoids from cultures and environmental samples have been developed in the last two decades. However, the structural diversity of hopanoids, and possible variability in their ionization efficiencies on different instruments, have thus far precluded robust quantification and hindered comparison of results between laboratories. These ionization inconsistencies give rise to the need to calibrate individual instruments with purified hopanoids

SUBMITTER: Wu CH 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC4676935 | biostudies-literature | 2015 Jul

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature