Química Analítica Avanzada para Ciencias de la Vida. ACCLifeSci. ERASMUS+
Name
Química Analítica Avanzada para Ciencias de la Vida. ACCLifeSci. ERASMUS+
Principal Investigator
Antonia García
Financial entity
Unión Europea. Agencia ERASMUS +
2015-PL01-KA203-016654
Funding
298,631 €
Duration
01/09/2015 – 31/08/2018
Abstract
Syllabus:
The educational and scientific project: Advanced Analytical Chemistry for Life Sciences (ACCLifeSci), coordinated by Prof. Dr Hab. Elżbieta Skrzydlewska, the Dean of MUB’s Faculty of Pharmacy, and financed from Erasmus+ Programme joins three universities:
- Medical University of Białystok, Faculty of Pharmacy with the Division of Laboratory Medicine (The Leader)
- Aveiro University (Portugal, partner)
- University San Pablo-CEU (Spain, partner)
The Intellectual Outputs
Manuscript for teaching AAC in omics sciences:
E-materials for teaching AAC in omics sciences:
Terms of use: All the above Intellectual Outputs are licensed under Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 3.0 License CC BY-NC 3.0. They are attributed to Pedro Domingues, Antonia García and Elżbieta Skrzydlewska (editors) and the original versions can be found under the links above.
The Intellectual Outputs were created in Białystok (Poland), Aveiro (Portugal) and Madrid (Spain) in 2015-18, completed in August 2018.
Description
Metabolomics can be considered a well stablished discipline for studying the ultimate expression of the phenotype. Nevertheless, this complete characterization has not been achieved yet. In a typical untargeted metabolomics study, more than 50% of the signals that can be assigned to a unique molecular entity remain unidentified.
As the overall objective of the project, we expect to cover part of this gap, and to increase the number of identified metabolites, by improving in specific points of the methodology. Furthermore, with such improvement in metabolite identification, we aim at achieving better understanding of the metabolic processes involved. We propose to achieve this goal by means of 6 specific objectives:
- Expanding identification capabilities by GC-MS
- The comprehensive characterization of biological samples with authentic standards and reference materials, as well as the low energy source in GC-QTOF-MS, will enlarge our metabolite libraries. Among those metabolites, those related to the gut microflora, that may involve a complex interplay and cross talk between the immune system, the endocrine system, and even the Central Nervous System, will be part of the non-previously identified compounds. Moreover, new methodologies for sample treatment, and for volatile compounds, , will permit us to build a more complete and more detailed database of compounds.
- Extending identification capabilities by CE-MS
- The implementation of new methods for the analysis of neutral and anionic compounds, along with the in-source fragmentation strategy in CE-MS will permit us to add new records to the database of identified compounds. Among the metabolites that could be identified with CEMS, the possible epi-metabolites, i.e. identified compounds that could be associated to simple metabolic processes such as methylation and acetylation, will be integrated into the biological interpretation of the processes involved in the different biological questions.
- Extending identification capabilities by LC-QTOF-MS: thorough identification of modified lipids and oxidized phospholipids
- Lipids are still poorly represented in the databases, and this lack of records is even higher when dealing with oxidised lipids. We plan to expand our knowledge of these compounds, by means of advanced analytical strategies for purification and structural elucidation, combined with the work with CEU Mass Mediator (Objective 5)
- Extending identification capabilities by LC-QqQ-MS: Chiral Metabolomics
- In addition, the differentiation of chiral compounds by means of advanced analytical strategies will expand the number of processes that could be elucidated. Different strategies: labelling agent and separation conditions will be optimized to stablish the definite chiral metabolomics method to be applied in CEMBIO.
- Development of the tool CEU Mass Mediator
- We have worked extensively in the CEU Mass Mediator, and we plan to keep on working on this tool, adding more capabilities such as the spectral quality evaluation. In addition, better ways for integration of data from different instrumental platforms (LC/MS, CE/MS, GC/MS) and omics (proteomics, transcriptomics, genomics) will be studied.
- Applications
- In the previous years, CEMBIO has been able to stablish a broad network of collaborators: Cardiovascular diseases, Obesity and bariatric surgery, Diabetes, Cancer, Perinatal metabolomics, Infectious diseases, and Neurodegenerative disorders