Carbon-13 (¹³co₂) Breath Testing

Isolab Scientific provides a comprehensive mass spectrometry service for carbon-13 breath test samples and also can offer help in experimental design and data interpretation.

Carbon-13 breath testing has been used in gastrointestinal research for many years as safe, simple and non-invasive methods of monitoring organ function and nutritional status. They have been employed in study of gastric emptying, liver function, fat absorption, P450 mixed-function oxidase, bacterial overgrowth, oro-caecal transit time, etc.

In simple terms, carbon-13 breath testing involves the ingestion of a substrate (commonly used substrates include: acetate, caffeine, erythromycin, octanoic acid, urea, triglyceride or xylose) labelled on one or more functional groups with 13C. These 13C labeled functional groups are cleaved from the rest of the substrate molecule by the action of specific enzymes. The functional groups then further oxide until ¹³ C enriched CO₂ is produced and excreted in breath and the ¹³C:¹²C ratio in serially collected breath samples is measured by isotope ratio mass spectrometry. See Example Laboratory Report* for ¹³C-Urea breath tests to detect Helicobacter pylori infection.

Breath Testing options include:

• Liver Function Breath Tests
• Gastric Emptying Breath Tests
• Bacterial Overgrowth Breath Tests
• Oro-Caecal Transit Time Breath Tests
• We also offer a range of other Breath Tests, see website for more details.

For more information on the different types of samples we accept, how to store them an analyse them, as well as an example Laboratory report, click here. 

Interested? Get in touch at sales@isolab-scientific.com or call +44 (0) 203 278 2351 or at. We’ll be straight back to you.

You can follow us on LinkedIn for the most up to date news and information.