A selective method for the identification of bacterial cyclic β-amino fatty acid lipopeptides.
Chromatographic separation coupled with high resolution mass spectrometry analysis at varying collision energies allows the determination of both amino-acid sequence and the presence of β-amino fatty acids.
β-amino fatty acid immonium ions can be used as diagnostic fragments for selected lipopeptides.
A linear relationship between length of fatty acid and retention time within linear gradient was confirmed.
The method allows the detection of lipopeptide variants, including minor congeners, in comparison to non-targeted methods.