Recent developments in liquid chromatography, such as the introduction of ultra-high performance liquid chromatography (UHPLC) instruments and columns with sub-2 μm and solid core particles, make ultra-fast separations possible. Combined with the current trend towards the use of high-resolution mass spectrometry (HRMS) in quantitative applications, this would allow simultaneous high-throughput quantitative bioanalysis and information-rich, qualitative metabolite identification within a single, short analysis, in a so-called Quan/Qual workflow.

The aim of this project, which is a collaboration project of the LACDR and Janssen Pharmaceutica NV, is to develop a generic method for Quan/Qual analysis of small molecule drugs, their metabolites and endogenous metabolites in (pre-)clinical samples. Such a method is of high value in drug development, as it would reduce the need for compound-specific bioanalytical method development, and it can be applied to a variety of studies, including tox-studies and drug metabolism studies. Due to the untargeted approach, the data collected with this method will contain a myriad of information that has the potential to be used not only for the traditional objectives of parent drug pharmacokinetics and metabolite identification, but also for biomarker discovery.