Sensitive quantification of short-chain fatty acids combined with global metabolomics in microbiome cultures

The microbiome has been identified to have a key role for the physiology of their human host. One of the major impacts is the clearance of bacterial pathogens. We have now developed a chemoselective probe methodology for the absolute quantification of short-chain fatty acids at low nM concentrations, with high reproducibility and spiked isotope labelled internal standards. Immobilization to magnetic beads allows for separation from the matrix and the tagged metabolites upon bioorthogonal cleavage can be analyzed via UHPLC-MS. The major advantage of our sensitive method is the simple combination with global metabolomics analysis as only a small sample volume is required. We have applied this chemical metabolomics strategy for targeted SCFA analysis combined with global metabolomics on gut microbiome co-cultures with Salmonella and investigated the effect of antibiotic treatment.