Elemental bioimaging and speciation analysis for the investigation of Wilson's disease using μxRF and XANES

Hachmöller O., Buzanich A., Aichler M., Radtke M., Dietrich D., Schwamborn K., Lutz L., Werner M., Sperling M., Walch A., Karst U.

Abstract

A liver biopsy specimen from a Wilson's disease (WD) patient was analyzed by means of micro-X-ray fluorescence (μXRF) spectroscopy to determine the elemental distribution. First, bench-top μXRF was utilized for a coarse scan of the sample under laboratory conditions. The resulting distribution maps of copper and iron enabled the determination of a region of interest (ROI) for further analysis. In order to obtain more detailed elemental information, this ROI was analyzed by synchrotron radiation (SR)-based μXRF with a beam size of 4 μm offering a resolution at the cellular level. Distribution maps of additional elements to copper and iron like zinc and manganese were obtained due to a higher sensitivity of SR-μXRF. In addition to this, X-ray absorption near edge structure spectroscopy (XANES) was performed to identify the oxidation states of copper in WD. This speciation analysis indicated a mixture of copper(i) and copper(ii) within the WD liver tissue.