Quantitative analysis of methylmalonic acid in human plasma by LC-MS/MS after derivatization

Methylmalonic acid (MMA) is a reverse biomarker of vitamin B12 that is increasingly utilized in clinical practice. However, its low sensitivity and susceptibility to strong interference from isomer present chromatographic challenges. We have developed a rapid derivatization method for plasma MMA at room temperature, converting it to the corresponding 2,2,2-trifluoroethylamide derivative using N-(3-dimethylaminopropyl)-N’-ethylcarbodiimide hydrochloride (EDC) and 2,2,2-trifluoroethylamine hydrochloride (TFEA). Amidization was completed within 10 min, followed by protein precipitation extraction of the amides with trichloroacetic acid for Liquid chromatography-tandem mass spectrometry (LC-MS/MS) analysis. This technique notably enhanced the signal-to-noise ratio of MMA in chromatography. The derivatized MMA exhibited excellent linearity within a concentration range of 42.4–2711.9 nmol/L, with a correlation coefficient (R²) of 0.9990. The intraday and interday precision of replicate measurements ranged from 2.4 % to 4.4 % and 2.6 % to 2.8 %, respectively, while the recovery fell between 97.9 % and 100.1 %.