Metabolomics Community in Russia: History of Development, Key Participants, and Results

Abstract

Metabolomics is the latest trend in the "-omics" sciences, of which technologies are widely used today in all life sciences. Metabolomics gave impetus to the description of biochemical processes that occur in many organisms, search for new biomarkers of disease, and laid the foundation for new clinical laboratory diagnostics. The purpose of this review is to show how metabolomics is represented in Russian science, what main research areas were chosen, and to demonstrate the successes and main achievements of Russian scientists in this field. The review is dedicated to the 10th anniversary of Russian metabolomics and also touches on the history of the formation of Russian metabolomics and prospects for the future.

Keywords: Russian science; mass spectrometry; metabolomics.

Figure 1

The sequential interconnection of “-omes” in a living system, which reflects the flow of information encoded in genes to the molecular phenotype of an organism—a metabolome.

Figure 2

Obtaining a diagnostic signature on the example of impaired glucose tolerance (IGT). Blood plasma samples were treated with methanol to precipitate the protein, and low molecular weight fractions were analyzed by direct injection of blood plasma metabolites into an electrospray mass spectrometer source. Metabolite ions that showed a statistically significant association with IGT were included in the diagnostic signature. For ions included in the signature, correspondence to specific metabolites in the metabolite databases was established. The mass spectrometric signature is written in a unified form: the molecular weights of the ions of substances detected by direct mass spectrometry of blood plasma are indicated, the threshold value in quantiles is indicated in the upper register. If the threshold value is exceeded, then the diagnostic score (mass spectrometry-based glucose tolerance test score) should be increased by one.

Figure 3

The scheme for obtaining a human digital image based on the mass spectrometry data of a blood metabolome. A dry spot of capillary blood on filter paper is sent to the laboratory for metabolomic investigation (1). The low molecular weight substances are extracted from a blood sample and injected directly into the ionization source of the mass spectrometer (2). The mass spectrum of blood metabolites (3) obtained by DIMS are processed (4) following the protocol presented in the publication [25]. The personal blood metabolome (5) obtained from the data processing is used to create a human digital image, which is presented as a QR code (6). Adapted from [25].