Quantitative Measurement of Plasma 3-Hydroxyisovaleryl Carnitine by LC-MS/MS as a Novel Biomarker of Biotin Status in Humans

An increased plasma concentration of 3-hydroxyisovaleryl carnitine (3HIA-carnitine) results from impairment in the leucine catabolic pathway at the conversion of 3-methylcrotonyl-CoA to 3-methylglutaconyl-CoA. The impairment is caused by reduced activity of the biotin-dependent enzyme 3-methylcrotonyl-CoA carboxylase. Here, we describe an LC-MS/MS method for the quantitation of 3HIA-carnitine in plasma and present preliminary evidence validating plasma 3HIA-carnitine as a novel biomarker of biotin deficiency in humans. Three healthy adult subjects were successfully made marginally biotin deficient by feeding of a 30% egg-white diet for 28 days. For each subject, the plasma 3HIA-carnitine increased approximately 3-fold from Study Day 0 to Study Day 28 (p = 0.027). These results indicate that plasma 3HIA-carnitine concentration increases with biotin deficiency. If these results are confirmed in larger studies, plasma 3HIA-carnitine is likely to be an important indicator of biotin status in a variety of clinical circumstances because quantitation of 3HIA-carnitine by this method has several technical advantages over existing validated indicators of biotin status in humans.