Identification of conjugation positions of urinary glucuronidated vitamin D3 metabolites by LC/ESI–MS/MS after conversion to MS/MS‐fragmentable derivatives

A liquid chromatography/electrospray ionization–tandem mass spectrometry‐based method was developed for the identification of the conjugation positions of the monoglucuronides of 25‐hydroxyvitamin D3 [25(OH)D3] and 24,25‐dihydroxyvitamin D3 [24,25(OH)2D3] in human urine. The method employed derivatization with 4‐(4‐dimethylaminophenyl)‐1,2,4‐triazoline‐3,5‐dione to convert the glucuronides into fragmentable derivatives, which provided useful product ions for identifying the conjugation positions during the MS/MS. The derivatization also enhanced the assay sensitivity and specificity for urine sample analysis. The positional isomeric monoglucuronides, 25(OH)D3‐3‐ and ‐25‐glucuronides, or 24,25(OH)2D3‐3‐, ‐24‐ and ‐25‐glucuronides, were completely separated from each other under the optimized LC conditions. Using this method, the conjugation positions were successfully determined to be the C3 and C24 positions for the glucuronidated 25(OH)D3 and 24,25(OH)2D3, respectively. The 3‐glucuronide was not present for 24,25(OH)2D3, unlike 25(OH)D3, thus we found that selective glucuronidation occurs at the C24‐hydroxy group for 24,25(OH)2D3.