Related Experiment Video
Updated: Jan 14, 2026
Dried Blood and Serum Spots As A Useful Tool for Sample Storage to Evaluate Cancer Biomarkers
Published on: June 11, 2018
Dried blood spots analysis for targeted and non-targeted exposomics
Vinicius Verri Hernandes1, Maximilian Zeyda2, Lukas Wisgrill3
1Faculty of Chemistry, Department of Food Chemistry and Toxicology, University of Vienna, Währinger Straße 38, 1090 Vienna, Austria; Exposome Austria, Research Infrastructure and National EIRENE Node, Vienna, Austria.
Dried blood spots (DBS) offer a minimally invasive method for assessing chemical exposures and metabolic health. This study optimizes a workflow for combined exposomic and metabolomic analysis in DBS, enabling broader toxicological and biological insights.
Area of Science:
- Environmental Chemistry
- Analytical Chemistry
- Biomolecular Analysis
Background:
- Dried blood spots (DBS) are widely used for newborn screening and hold potential for assessing chemical exposures due to their minimally invasive nature.
- Comprehensive evaluations of analytical parameters and combined targeted/non-targeted approaches in DBS for small-molecule omics are limited.
Purpose of the Study:
- To develop and optimize a liquid chromatography-high resolution mass spectrometry (LC-HRMS) workflow for integrated exposomic and metabolomic analysis in DBS samples.
- To evaluate extraction efficiency, matrix effects, and analytical performance for diverse chemical classes in DBS.
Main Methods:
- Systematic comparison of four extraction protocols for DBS.
- Analytical performance evaluation of >200 xenobiotics (PFAS, pesticides, etc.) and endogenous metabolites using LC-HRMS.
- Combined targeted and non-targeted data analysis for exposomic and metabolomic profiling.
Main Results:
- An optimized protocol achieved acceptable recoveries (60-140%) and reproducibility (median RSD: 18%) for most compounds, with manageable matrix effects (median 76%).
- Eleven target exposure compounds were identified in real-life DBS samples, with several novel findings for human biomonitoring.
- Integrated analysis successfully identified endogenous metabolites and expanded the detectable chemical space through non-targeted methods.
Conclusions:
- The optimized DBS workflow enables integrated exposomics and metabolomics, providing valuable toxicological and biological insights from low-volume samples.
- This approach supports both prospective and retrospective studies, enhancing the utility of DBS in large-scale epidemiological research and chemical exposure assessment.
