Global Metabolomics: from Innovation to Integration

Abstract: Global metabolomics is an emerging field in postgenomic biology that correlates the comprehensive analysis of small molecules in biological systems with phenotypes and biological processes. Over the past 15 years, there have been many innovative developments in analytical strategies and informatics, making it possible to integrate metabolomic analysis with orthogonal omics (i.e. genomics, transcriptomics, proteomics) to garner systems-level information on the biological function of metabolites. This seminar will focus on current progresses in analytical technologies and bioinformatics that address the challenges in global metabolomics, including metabolomic data processing and metabolite identification. Advancing from innovation to integration, a recently developed metabolomics-guided systems biology platform will be introduced, which can provide a mechanistic understanding of metabolomic data through multi-omic integration aimed at identifying dysregulated metabolic pathways. To illustrate the importance of integrative metabolomic analysis in deciphering biological causality, a specific case study in cancer metabolism, on identifying aberrant metabolic pathways involved in biofilm development in colon cancer, will be discussed.