Merrill Alfred H, Stokes Todd H, Momin Amin, Park Hyejung, Portz Brent J, Kelly Samuel, Wang Elaine, Sullards M Cameron, Wang May Dongmei
School of Biology, Georgia Institute of Technology, Atlanta, GA 30332, USA.
J Lipid Res. 2009 Apr;50 Suppl(Suppl):S97-102. doi: 10.1194/jlr.R800073-JLR200. Epub 2008 Nov 21.
The sphingolipidome is the portion of the lipidome that encompasses all sphingoid bases and their derivatives. Whereas the most studied sphingoid base is sphingosine [(2S,3R,4E)-2-aminooctadecene-1,3-diol], mammals have dozens of structural variants, and hundreds of additional types have been found in other eukaryotic organisms and some bacteria and viruses. Multiplying these figures by the N-acyl-derivatives ("ceramides") and the more than 500 phospho- and glyco- headgroups places the number of discrete molecular species in the tens of thousands or higher. Structure-specific, quantitative information about a growing fraction of the sphingolipidome can now be obtained using various types of chromatography coupled with tandem mass spectrometry, and application of these methods is producing many surprises regarding sphingolipid structure, metabolism, and function. Such large data sets can be difficult to interpret, but the development of tools that display results from genomic and lipidomic studies in a pathway relational, nodal, context can make it easier for investigators to deal with this complexity.
鞘脂组是脂质组的一部分，涵盖所有鞘氨醇碱及其衍生物。虽然研究最多的鞘氨醇碱是鞘氨醇[（2S，3R，4E）-2-氨基十八碳烯-1,3-二醇]，但哺乳动物有数十种结构变体，在其他真核生物以及一些细菌和病毒中还发现了数百种其他类型。将这些数字乘以N-酰基衍生物（“神经酰胺”）以及500多种磷酸和糖头基团，离散分子种类的数量可达数万甚至更多。现在可以使用各种类型的色谱法与串联质谱联用，获得关于鞘脂组中越来越多部分的结构特异性定量信息，并且这些方法的应用正在产生许多关于鞘脂结构、代谢和功能的惊人发现。如此庞大的数据集可能难以解释，但开发能够以通路关联、节点、背景的方式展示基因组和脂质组学研究结果的工具，可以让研究人员更容易应对这种复杂性。
