analysis
was performed in a Maxis II ETD Q-TOF mass spectrometer (Bruker Daltonics,
Germany) using an electrospray ionization (ESI) source with either
an Elute UHPLC (Bruker Daltonics, Germany) or a 1260 Infinity II Binary
Pump (Agilent Technologies, USA) system. The separation was performed
on an Acquity UPLC HSS T3 column (1.8 μm, 100 × 2.1 mm)
from Waters Corporation. Milli-Q water with 0.1% formic acid was used
as mobile phase A, and LC–MS grade methanol with 0.1% formic
acid was used as mobile phase B. The column temperature was kept at
40 °C, and the autosampler temperature was kept at 4 °C.
The flow rate was set to 0.22 mL/min with an injection volume of 5
μL. The gradient used was as follows: 0–2 min, 0% B;
2–15 min, 0–100% B; 15–16 min, 100% B; 16–17
min, 100–0% B; 17–23 min, 0% B. The system was controlled
using the Compass HyStar software package from Bruker (Bruker Daltonics,
Germany). High-resolution mass spectra were acquired in negative mode
at a mass range of m/z 50–1200.
Data acquisition was performed in AutoMSMS mode (data-dependent acquisition,
DDA) with a cycle time of 0.5 s and a ramped collision energy from
20 to 50 eV. A solution of sodium formate [10 mM in a mixture of 2-propanol/water
(1/1, v/v)] was used for internal calibration at the beginning of
each run, in a segment between 0.10 and 0.31 min.