In the "omics" world, lipids have long been in the shadows, while nucleic acids and proteins hogged the limelight. But now, this broad-ranging class of biomolecules is stepping into the spotlight as well. And mass spectrometry (MS) is the tool that is making it possible. Not only to identify lipids but also to address where lipids are-which tissues and where in those tissues, researchers are turning to mass spectrometric imaging, which converts spatial distributions of mass-to-charge ratios into pictures of the locations of different molecules.
The LIPID MAPS consortium (including Alfred Merrill Jr., Professor and Smithgall Chair in Molecular Cell Biology in the School of Biology at Georgia Tech) are focusing on two types of mass spectrometric imaging-conventional matrix-assisted laser desorption/ionization (MALDI), and secondary ion mass spectrometry (SIMS).
The full story can be found here:
http://pubs.acs.org/cen/coverstory/89/8941cover.html

Much of this research was conducted in the Parker H. Petit Institute for Bioengineering & Bioscience at Georgia Tech.