Metabolomics Laboratory

The metabolomics laboratory is part of the state-of–the-art CADET facility and is one of CADET’s two main research facilities Researchers at the laboratory are able to carry out small and large scale studies of cells, tissues and biofluids in order to investigate the role of metabolites in disease onset and progression, and in drug discovery.

Metabolomics is the study of small chemical compounds, known as metabolites (sugars, amino acids, fats and many others) in biological systems. CADET researchers are successfully applying metabolomics to define the biological mechanisms relevant to health, disease and ageing, as well as to develop new therapeutics.

There are two types of experimental strategy that can be applied to metabolomics studies.

Discovery studies perform metabolic profiling, where how much and how many of a wide range of metabolites are determined. Differences in either the number or amounts of metabolites are measured statistically between for example, healthy and diseased tissue from patients.

Targeted studies determine absolute amounts to a high level of precision and accuracy of a small number of metabolites, which are the ones of greatest biological interest determined from discovery phase studies.

CADET'S metabolomics laboratory is run by four experienced scientists, including lead researcher Dr Warwick Dunn. The laboratory situated within CADET has the capability to study a wide range of biological samples including blood products, urine, cerebrospinal fluid, cells, tissues and organs.