The brain is one of the most complicated structured and functional organs, the signal transduction and communication of the brain metabolic network is the important molecular mechanism and functional basis, which is of great significance for the function study of the central nervous system,the pathogenesis explanation of mental diseases as well as the drug development. However, it is challenging for the characterization of metabolic networks as well as molecular recognition in the brain due to the variety of the metabolites in the metabolic networks and their physical and chemical properties.
Zeper Abliz /JiumingHe's team (in the State Key Laboratory of Bioactive Substance and Function of Natural Medicines, Institute of Materia Medica, Chinese Academy of Medical Sciences and Peking Union Medical College) developed a spatial metabolomics method to map the metabolic networks in brain by using a home-made ambient air flow-assisted desorption electrospray ionization (AFADESI)-MSI and metabolic pathway analysis, not only profiling more than 20 metabolic pathways, including neurotransmitters and purine metabolism, but also revealing the dysregulated metabolites and their microregional distribution characteristics in the scopolamine-treated impairment model of learning and memory rat. This metabolic networks mapping method provides a creative analysis approach and insight into the central nervous system's physiological, pathological, and pharmacological studies.
The findings, entitled "Mapping Metabolic Networks in the Brain by Ambient Mass Spectrometry Imaging and metabolomics" were recently published as a cover paper in the authoritative Journal Analytical Chemistry, 2021, 93, 17, 6746-6754.
In the past 10 years, the MS lab has been committed AFADESI to a new MSI technology with independent intellectual property, solving the simultaneous imaging problem of low-content drugs, related metabolites, and thousands of endogenous metabolites in biological tissues. With the development of spatial metabolomics method using AFADESI-MSI, it was applied in the tumor heterogeneity investigation, tumor metabolism, brain metabolism, in situ biomarkers discovery, and the distribution or mechanism study of the drug in the whole body and specific microregions.
In this work, Dr.XuechaoPangis the first author, Zeper Abliz andJiumingHeare the co-corresponding authors. This work was funded by the National Natural Science Foundation of China, the National Scientific and Technological Major Project for New Drugs.
