Gas Chromatography Detection Protocol of Short-chain Fatty Acids in Mice Feces

Short-chain fatty acids (SCFAs), which are formed mainly by bacteria fermenting undigested carbohydrates in the colon, they are based on the number of carbon atoms in the carbon chain. Organic fatty acids with less than 6 carbon atoms are called short-chain fatty acids. SCFAs are closely related to various aspects of the human body, so more and more researchers concentrate on SCFAs. This protocol describes, a direct injection gas chromatography detection method with a pretreatment method for extracting SCFA from mice feces by combining acidification. The corresponding sample limit of quantization (LOQ) and limit of detection (LOD) are 0.8-1.0 mg/L and 0.5-0.8 mg/L, respectively. The correlation coefficient of calibration curve is greater than 0.999. The recovery rate of the spiked standard is 80%-102%. This method can be used to analyze and determine SCFAs in mice feces. Therefore, this is an economical, effective and reproducible method for SCFAs measurement in mice samples.