Downs Diana M, Bazurto Jannell V, Gupta Anuj, Fonseca Luis L, Voit Eberhard O
Department of Microbiology, University of Georgia, Athens, GA, 30602, USA.
Department of Biological Sciences, University of Idaho, Moscow, ID, 83844, USA.
AIMS Microbiol. 2018 Apr 8;4(2):289-303. doi: 10.3934/microbiol.2018.2.289. eCollection 2018.
Traditional biochemical research has resulted in a good understanding of many aspects of metabolism. However, this reductionist approach is time consuming and requires substantial resources, thus raising the question whether modern metabolomics and genomics should take over and replace the targeted experiments of old. We proffer that such a replacement is neither feasible not desirable and propose instead the tight integration of modern, system-wide omics with traditional experimental bench science and dedicated computational approaches. This integration is an important prerequisite toward the optimal acquisition of knowledge regarding metabolism and physiology in health and disease. The commentary describes advantages and drawbacks of current approaches to assessing metabolism and highlights the challenges to be overcome as we strive to achieve a deeper level of metabolic understanding in the future.
传统的生物化学研究已经使我们对新陈代谢的许多方面有了很好的理解。然而，这种还原论方法耗时且需要大量资源，因此引发了一个问题，即现代代谢组学和基因组学是否应该取而代之并取代过去的靶向实验。我们认为这种取代既不可行也不可取，相反，我们建议将现代的全系统组学与传统的实验台科学及专门的计算方法紧密结合。这种整合是在健康和疾病状态下最佳获取有关新陈代谢和生理学知识的重要前提。这篇评论描述了当前评估新陈代谢方法的优缺点，并强调了在我们努力在未来实现对新陈代谢更深入理解的过程中需要克服的挑战。
