The concept, characteristics and history of metabonomics are introduced. The techniques used in data acquisition and data analysis in metabonomics including their advantages and disadvantages are summarized. In data acquisition platform, NMR, GC/MS, LC/MS (/MS) are the prevalent techniques although at present, none of them is a perfect technique that could meet with the requirement of the metabonomics for measuring all metabolites. While in data analysis, the PCA, PLS and ANN are the major techniques. The researchers could select them according to the research destination. Recent advances and applications of metabonomics in disease diagnosis, drug toxicity evaluation, plant metabolomics and microbial metabolomics are reviewed. In addition, by giving the situation on the establishment of the related corporations, the conferences about metabonomics and proclamation of NIH roadmap the current boom of the metabonomics is reflected. It can be expected that with the development of the function genomics, metabonomics will play a major role in the discovery of the phynotype of the genome and searching for the disease diagnostic biomarkers, and it will also bring much benefit to the drug discovery, clinical diagnosis and nutrition science.
Humans ; Metabolome ; Metabolomics ; trends

Metabonomics (or metabolomics) aims at the comprehensive and quantitative analysis of the wide arrays of metabolites in biological samples. Metabonomics has been labeled as one of the new" -omics" joining genomics, transcriptomics, and proteomics as a science employed toward the understanding of global systems biology. It has been widely applied in many research areas including drug toxicology, biomarker discovery, functional genomics, and molecular pathology etc. The comprehensive analysis of the metabonome is particularly challenging due to the diverse chemical natures of metabolites. Metabonomics investigations require special approaches for sample preparation, data-rich analytical chemical measurements, and information mining. The outputs from a metabonomics study allow sample classification, biomarker discovery, and interpretation of the reasons for classification information. This review focuses on the currently new advances in various technical platforms of metabonomics and its applications in drug discovery and development, disease biomarker identification, plant and microbe related fields.
Biomarkers ; Drug Discovery ; Metabolome ; Metabolomics ; trends

Facing the complicated life phenomemon, both metabonomics and pharmaco-metabonomics take an organic conception of the human body, which conforms to the way of thinking of traditional Chinese medicine (TCM). The application of metabonomics and pharmaco-metabonomics in the modernization of TCM will deepen the evaluation of the therapeutic effects of TCM, the study of intrinsic quality of TCM syndrome and the treatment by differentiation of syndrome, facilitate the integration of TCM with modern biological science and technology, promote the modernization of TCM, and provide a new space for the development of TCM.
Humans ; Medicine, Chinese Traditional ; trends ; Metabolomics ; Social Change

Internal environment of metabolism of traditional Chinese medicine (TCM) is a dynamic process, which is in line with the "holistic-dynamic-comprehensive-analytic" characteristics of metabonomics, therefore metabonomics have a unique advantage to reveal the metabolic pattern of TCM. The application of metabonomics in TCM has great practical significance in understanding the pharmacodynamic/toxic effect material basis, mechanisms and guiding for determination of dosage and treatment course; At the same time, the scientific compatibility of TCM prescription, the germplasm resources of TCM and the preclinical safety/toxicity can be widely researched. At present, metabolomics has become a leading technology in many industries and fields including the research and development of TCM. The core of metabolomics is analytical technology, because comprehensive metabolite profiles or accurate identification of known metabolites can be obtained from complex biological samples only by appropriate analytical techniques. At the same time, a series of bioinformatics/chemical informatics/stoichiometry methods are needed to process the data, so as to obtain the potential law and information in the mass data. In this paper, the concept of metabolomics, relevant analytical techniques, data processing methods and applications were explained and analyzed clearly. In addition, the core problems and countermeasures of metabolomics were summarized, and the future development of metabolomics was prospected as well.
Computational Biology ; Humans ; Medicine, Chinese Traditional ; Metabolomics ; Research ; trends

Metabolomics is an interdisciplinary subject that rose in the post-genomic era, which focuses on quantitative study of the response of living organisms to outside stimulation and pathophysiological changes, as well as multiple dynamic response of the level of in vivo metabolites caused by genetic mutation. It is extensively used in basic research of system biology, materia medica, clinical medicine, etc. In the forensic field, metabolomics mainly focuses on forensic toxicology, but with the generalization of certain techniques, it's foreseeable that metabolomics has a broad research prospect in forensic pathology. This article summarizes the major analysis techniques and methods of metabolomics, describes the research status of metabolomic techniques in the field of forensic pathology application research, including postmortem interval and death cause. Moreover, this article summarizes and discusses the potential applicable areas, in order to provide reference for relative research and application.
Autopsy ; Forensic Pathology/trends* ; Forensic Toxicology ; Humans ; Metabolomics ; Postmortem Changes

Metabolomics is an emerging discipline subsequent to genomics, transcriptomics and proteomics, aiming for systematically studying the regularity of changes in metabolite to revealing organism's nature of movement and metabolism. It is especially important in modern pharmacological studies. Metabolic fingerprinting analysis is a method for metabolic analysis on high throughput of all metabolites, studying changes in drugs, organisms and endogenic metabolites caused by drugs and finding out related biomarkers to reflect dynamic changes inside organisms more directly and explain the mechanism of drugs and their effects on diseases. This essay summarizes some new metabolic fingerprint analytical methods and data processing methods used for metabolic fingerprint, elaborates their advantages and disadvantages and looks ahead to their combination with studies on traditional Chinese medicines, providing room for the development of new methods and new approaches for studies on complexity theory system of traditional Chinese medicines.
Data Mining ; methods ; trends ; Metabolomics ; methods ; trends ; Plants, Medicinal ; chemistry ; genetics ; metabolism

Metabolomics is a subject of systematic, qualitative and quantitative analysis of all metabolites in all organisms, which is applied to finding biomarkers and studying pathogenesis of diseases. Study procedures of metabolomics include data acquisition by spectroscopic/spectrometric techniques, multivariate statistical analysis and projection of the acquired metabolomic information. In recent years, metabolomics have gained popularity in orthopedic field. Metabolomic study of osteoarthritis was firstly conducted and widely developed. Metabolite profiles of different samples, including serum/plasma, urine, synovial fluid and synovial tissue, were studied and dozens of differential metabolites and several disturbed metabolic pathways were found. In addition, metabolomic studies of osteoporosis, ankylosing spondylitis and bone tumors were also conducted, which identified many potential biomarkers and made further understanding of pathogenesis of corresponding disease. However, metabolomic studies in orthopedic field just begin. More orthopedic diseases will be researched thank to the satisfactory results of previous reports.
Biomarkers ; Humans ; Metabolomics ; trends ; Multivariate Analysis ; Orthopedic Procedures ; Orthopedics ; trends ; Osteoporosis ; Spondylitis, Ankylosing

Serum pharmacochemistry of traditional Chinese medicine (TCM) is designed to screen the efficacy material base of TCMs from the constituents absorbed into the blood after oral administration. The theory and method is in accordance with the effect characteristics of TCMs, and reflects the interaction between the body and the drugs, has become an effective pathway for researching the efficacy material base of TCMs which has been recognized and used widely. In the paper, the previous research contents and methods of the serum pharmacochemistry of TCM were reviewed, and on the basis of the further validity of the special administration form of the TCM formula and the corresponding property to TCM syndrome, the new strategy of serum pharmacochemistry of TCM integrating the metabonomics technologies was put forward. According to the strategy, we take the biological characters of TCM syndrome as a research starting point, taking TCM formula as object, using the metabolic biomarkers of syndromes or disease to evaluate the therapeutic effect of formula and screen the compounds of TCMs in serum which are highly correlated with the metabolic biomarkers through the correlation analysis, and by further biological validation to finally confirm the efficacy material basis of TCMs. Integrating with the systems biology technologies, the theory and method of serum pharmacochemistry of TCM will further develop, and open a new chapter in the interpretation of the theory of TCM.
Animals ; Drug Therapy ; trends ; Drugs, Chinese Herbal ; chemistry ; pharmacokinetics ; Humans ; Metabolomics ; Serum ; chemistry

Metabonomics is a new method to study on the metabolic network and the relationship between body and environment, which conforms to the way of traditional Chinese medicine (TCM) research. In the study process of modernization of traditional Chinese medicine, effectively conjunction with metabonomics method will facilitate the integration of TCM with modern biological science and technology, and promote the modernization of TCM. This paper introduce the application of metabonomics in the research of toxicity mechanism of TCM, compatibility mechanism of TCM formula, pharmacology effect of TCM and processing mechanism of TCM. This paper summarize the problems in the TCM metabonomics research and prospect its bright future.
Animals ; Drug Therapy ; Drugs, Chinese Herbal ; adverse effects ; analysis ; metabolism ; therapeutic use ; Humans ; Medicine, Chinese Traditional ; methods ; trends ; Metabolomics ; methods ; trends

The rapid development of systems biology and especially the advances in the high-throughput and comprehensive research technologies and research idea in metabonomics provide new strategies in the analysis of active components in the formula of traditional Chinese medicine (TCM) and pharmacokinetic analysis of their metabolites in vivo. Furthermore, the initiatives of metabonomics may pave a new way to explain the action mode of TCM in the light of modern sciences, while the metabonomic research achievements may contribute to the establishment of a new technique platform for evaluating the efficacy of the formula of TCM.
Drugs, Chinese Herbal ; chemistry ; pharmacokinetics ; Humans ; Medicine, Chinese Traditional ; trends ; Metabolomics ; Social Change ; Systems Biology ; Treatment Outcome