. Author manuscript; available in PMC: 2009 Dec 1.

Published in final edited form as: Mitochondrion. 2008 May 23;8(5-6):396–413. doi: 10.1016/j.mito.2008.05.003

Table 1.

Chemical shift of the major metabolites observed in typical clinical ¹H-MRS spectra.

Parts Per Million Magnetic Field (ppm)	Metabolite	Properties
0.9 − 1.2	Lipids^*	Membrane constitutents
1.33	Lactate (doublet)	Product of anerobic glycolysis^{^}
2.02	N-acetyl-L-aspartate	Neuro-axonal marker
2.1 − 2.4	Glutamate/GABA/Glutamine^*⁺	Neurotransmittor
2.4	Succinate	Krebs cycle intermediate
3.03	Creatine/phosphocreatine	Energy metabolism
3.22	Choline compounds	Cell membrane marker
3.56	Myo-inositol^*	Glial cell marker, osmolyte

Best observed at short echo times (TE)

⁺

Best delineated with editing techniques or specialized acquisition (TE-80 ms at 3T for Glutamate/GABA/Glutamine).

^{^}

Also may be seen in mitochondrial disease states.