Quantifying yeast lipidomics by high-performance thin-layer chromatography (HPTLC) and comparison to mass spectrometry-based shotgun lipidomics

Microb Cell. 2024 Feb 21:11:57-68. doi: 10.15698/mic2024.02.815. eCollection 2024.

Abstract

Lipidomic analysis in diverse biological settings has become a frequent tool to increase our understanding of the processes of life. Cellular lipids play important roles not only as being the main components of cellular membranes, but also in the regulation of cell homeostasis as lipid signaling molecules. Yeast has been harnessed for biomedical research based on its good conservation of genetics and fundamental cell organisation principles and molecular pathways. Further application in so-called humanised yeast models have been developed which take advantage of yeast as providing the basics of a living cell with full control over heterologous expression. Here we present evidence that high-performance thin-layer chromatography (HPTLC) represents an effective alternative to replace cost intensive mass spectrometry-based lipidomic analyses. We provide statistical comparison of identical samples by both methods, which support the use of HPTLC for quantitative analysis of the main yeast lipid classes.

Keywords: HPTLC; lipid analysis; lipid metabolism; lipidomics; thin-layer chromatography.

Grants and funding

We are thankful to Sepp D. Kohlwein for sharing the dga1Δ lro1Δ are1Δ are2Δ QKO strain and Heimo Wolinski for sharing the pah1Δ strain.