A comparison of HPLC/APCI-MS and MALDI-MS for characterising triacylglycerols in insects: Species-specific composition of lipids in the fat bodies of bumblebee males

Two mass spectrometric methods for analysing triacylglycerols (HPLC/APCI-MS and MALDI-MS) were used and compared in terms of the relevance of the data for further biostatistical evaluation. While MALDI-MS is simpler and significantly faster, the time-consuming and labour-intensive HPLC/APCI-MS provides more complete information about the lipid components. However, both methods provide well-comparable results concerning the grouping of specimens belonging to different species when evaluated with multivariate exploratory approaches. The compositions of triacylglycerols in the fat bodies of males in 11 bumblebee species (Bombus terrestris, B. lucorum, B. lapidarius, B. pratorum, B. sylvarum, B. ruderatus, B. pomorum, B. subterraneus, B. campestris, B. bohemicus, and B. rupestris) were found to be species-specific.