- high-resolution terminology - matching measurements at high-resolution
Oxygen flux - instrumental background
Description
Instrumental background oxygen flux, J°O2, in a respirometer is due to oxygen consumption by the POS, and oxygen diffusion into or out of the aqueous medium in the O2k-Chamber. It is measured in the range of experimental oxygen levels by a standardized instrumental background test, and is a property of the instrumental system. Instrumental background correction eliminates errors by systemic flux compensation, automatically performed by DatLab.
Automatic correction for the instrumental background oxygen flux is an essential standard in high resolution respirometry. At the same time an instrumental background experiment is the ultimate test for instrumental performance, evaluating chamber performance after completion of all elements of the Sensor test. The instrumental background oxygen flux measured at air saturation should reflect the theoretically predicted volume-specific oxygen consumption by the oxygen sensor. The actual agreement using experimental respiration medium provides at the same time a test that excludes microbial contamination of the medium or serves to evaluate any autoxidation processes in newly tested experimental media.
Abbreviation: J°O2
Reference: MiPNet14.06; Gnaiger_2008_POS; Gnaiger_2001_RespPhysiol
MitoPedia methods:
Respirometry
- See MiPNet14.06 for experimental details of the instrumental background test, and for downloading the Excel template for analyzing instrumental background experiments.
- Compare Chemical background correction of oxygen flux.