Varian, Inc.'s New LC-NMR-MS System Helps Pharmaceutical Researchers Develop Safer, More Effective Drugs
Instrument Critical for Increasingly Important Field of "Metabonomics"
PALO ALTO, Calif., Varian, Inc. today introduced its LC-NMR-MS system, a new integrated scientific instrument geared for the latest challenges facing drug discovery and development laboratories. Combining three Varian core technologies -- liquid chromatography (LC), nuclear magnetic resonance (NMR) and mass spectrometry (MS) -- results in a powerful system that can more easily separate, identify and quantify molecules, such as metabolites, produced through biological processes.
The study of metabolites is of great importance to pharmaceutical researchers, particularly those associated with ADME (absorption, distribution, metabolism, excretion), toxicology and bio-availability as well as other groups developing in vitro diagnostic techniques. With the increases in sensitivity and throughput made possible over the past few years, NMR is playing a more important role in this work.
Using integrated LC-NMR-MS systems, researchers can study samples to reveal metabolite identity faster and with greater confidence than with separate analytical instrument offerings. Additionally, the U.S. FDA and other pharmaceutical regulatory bodies require that drug companies quantify and document metabolite identity.
"Many biologically relevant molecules and their bioconversion products have very similar structures and, often neither LC-MS nor LC-NMR will provide sufficient detail for a complete analysis," said Garry Rogerson, senior vice president of scientific instruments, Varian, Inc.
"By integrating three of Varian's core technologies into one coordinated system, we have developed a unit that will increase the productivity of a number of laboratories. We have maintained our trademark flexibility and high performance that will enable pharmaceutical groups to meet their challenging needs with this system," Rogerson continued.
In operation, compounds are first separated with the LC. The stream of resulting analytes eluted from the LC is split into two parallel streams that proceed to the mass spectrometer and to the NMR spectrometer. These two technologies are complementary -- mass spectrometry is both highly selective and sensitive, producing molecular weight and fragment data, while NMR is able to determine atomic connectivity. When combined, both sets of data result in more complete structural information. Obtaining both sets of data immediately with LC-NMR-MS increases the likelihood of generating an accurate structure for an unknown compound or confirming the presence of known compounds.
The Varian NMR spectrometer is renowned for its sensitivity and flexibility and is used for a variety of small molecule and proteomics applications. The Varian MS is available as a triple-quadrupole or in a single-quadrupole configuration that can be upgraded later to the triple-quadrupole analyzer. The LC-NMR-MS system is available for spectrometers ranging from 400 MHz to 800 MHz.
The system is available for delivery in September 2002.
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