ISTOCK, LUISMMOLINAMetabolomics screens can detect thousands of different compounds in a given sample, but contrary to the assumptions of numerous studies, not every detected compound represents a unique metabolite—far from it, according a to a study published today (September 15) in Analytical Chemistry.
Metabolomics researchers Gary Patti and Nathaniel Mahieu of Washington University in St. Louis report that out of about 25,000 compounds detected in E. coli by liquid-chromatography mass-spectroscopy (LC/MS), 90 percent were not unique metabolites. Rather, the same metabolite, fragmented or with chemical additions, is spotted multiple times, a phenomenon known as degeneracy. A second analysis, designed to weed out contaminants and artifacts in addition to degeneracy, confirmed just three percent of the observed compounds are bona fide, unique metabolites.
“This study confirms what I think a lot of people in the metabolomics world have known,” says University of Michigan endocrinologist Charles Burant, who was not involved in the work. “All these features that we see during mass spectroscopy, really, a lot of them are sort ...
