Synthesis of steroid bisglucuronide and sulfate glucuronide reference materials: Unearthing neglected treasures of steroid metabolism

Doubly or bisconjugated steroid metabolites have long been known as minor components of the steroid profile that have traditionally been studied by laborious and indirect fractionation, hydrolysis and gas chromatography-mass spectrometry (GC-MS) analysis. Recently, the synthesis and characterisation of steroid bis(sulfate) (aka disulfate or bis-sulfate) reference materials enabled the liquid chromatography-tandem mass spectrometry (LC-MS/MS) study of this metabolite class and the development of a constant ion loss (CIL) scan method for the direct and untargeted detection of steroid bis(sulfate) metabolites. Methods for the direct LC-MS/MS detection of other bisconjugated steroids, such as steroid bisglucuronide and mixed steroid sulfate glucuronide metabolites, have great potential to reveal a more complete picture of the steroid profile. However, access to steroid bisglucuronide or sulfate glucuronide reference materials necessary for LC-MS/MS method development, metabolite identification or quantification is severely limited. In this work, ten steroid bisglucuronide and ten steroid sulfate glucuronide reference materials were synthesised through an ordered combination of chemical sulfation and/or enzymatic glucuronylation reactions. All compounds were purified and characterised using NMR and MS methods. Chemistry for the preparation of stable isotope labelled steroid {¹³C₆}-glucuronide internal standards has also been developed and applied to the preparation of two selectively mono-labelled steroid bisglucuronide reference materials used to characterise more completely MS fragmentation pathways. The electrospray ionisation and fragmentation of the bisconjugated steroid reference materials has been studied. Preliminary targeted ultra-high-performance liquid chromatography-tandem mass spectrometry (UHPLC-MS/MS) analysis of the reference materials prepared revealed the presence of three steroid sulfate glucuronides as endogenous human urinary metabolites.

Tandem mass spectrometric characterization of bile acids and steroid conjugates based on low-energy collision-induced dissociation

We examined the characteristics of several bile acids and some steroid conjugates under low-energy-collision-induced dissociation conditions using a triple quadrupole tandem mass spectrometer. According to conjugation types, we observed characteristic product ions and/or neutral losses in the product ion spectra. Amino acid conjugates afforded specific product ions. For example, glycine-conjugated metabolites routinely produced a product ion at m/z 74, and taurine-conjugated metabolites produced product ions at m/z 124, 107, and 80. When a strong peak appeared at m/z 97, the molecule contained a sulfate group. In contrast to amino acid conjugates, carbohydrate conjugates required a combination of product ions and neutral losses for identification. We could discriminate a glucoside from an acyl galactoside according to the presence or absence of a product ion at m/z 161 and a neutral loss of 180 Da. Discrimination among esters, aliphatic ethers, and phenolic ether types of glucuronides was based upon differences in the intensities of a product ion at m/z 175 and a neutral loss of 176 Da. Furthermore, N-acetylglucosamine conjugates showed a characteristic product ion at m/z 202 and a neutral loss of 203 Da, and the appearance of a product ion at m/z 202 revealed the existence of N-acetylglucosamine conjugated to an aliphatic hydroxyl group without a double bond in the immediate vicinity. Together, the data presented here will help to enable the identification of unknown conjugated cholesterol metabolites by using low-energy collision-induced dissociation.