Paul L. Wood - Metabolomics

For further volumes: http://www.springer.com/series/7657 Neuromethods publishes cutting-edge methods and protocols in all areas of neuroscience as well as translational neurological and mental research. Each volume in the series offers tested laboratory protocols, step-by-step methods for reproducible lab experiments and addresses methodological controversies and pitfalls in order to aid neuroscientists in experimentation. Neuromethods focuses on traditional and emerging topics with wide-ranging implications to brain function, such as electrophysiology, neuroimaging, behavioral analysis, genomics, neurodegeneration, translational research and clinical trials. Neuromethods provides investigators and trainees with highly useful compendiums of key strategies and approaches for successful research in animal and human brain function including translational bench to bedside approaches to mental and neurological diseases.

Neuromethods publishes cutting-edge methods and protocols in all areas of neuroscience as well as translational neurological and mental research. Each volume in the series offers tested laboratory protocols, step-by-step methods for reproducible lab experiments and addresses methodological controversies and pitfalls in order to aid neuroscientists in experimentation. Neuromethods focuses on traditional and emerging topics with wide-ranging implications to brain function, such as electrophysiology, neuroimaging, behavioral analysis, genomics, neurodegeneration, translational research and clinical trials. Neuromethods provides investigators and trainees with highly useful compendiums of key strategies and approaches for successful research in animal and human brain function including translational bench to bedside approaches to mental and neurological diseases.

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Experimental life sciences have two basic foundations: concepts and tools. The Neuromethods series focuses on the tools and techniques unique to the investigation of the nervous system and excitable cells. It will not, however, shortchange the concept side of things as care has been taken to integrate these tools within the context of the concepts and questions under investigation. In this way, the series is unique in that it not only collects protocols but also includes theoretical background information and critiques which led to the methods and their development. Thus it gives the reader a better understanding of the origin of the techniques and their potential future development. The Neuromethods publishing program strikes a balance between recent and exciting developments like those concerning new animal models of disease, imaging, in vivo methods, and more established techniques, including, for example, immunocytochemistry and electrophysiological technologies. New trainees in neurosciences still need a sound footing in these older methods in order to apply a critical approach to their results.

Under the guidance of its founders, Alan Boulton and Glen Baker, the Neuromethods series has been a success since its first volume published through Humana Press in 1985. The series continues to flourish through many changes over the years. It is now published under the umbrella of Springer Protocols. While methods involving brain research have changed a lot since the series started, the publishing environment and technology have changed even more radically. Neuromethods has the distinct layout and style of the Springer Protocols program, designed specifically for readability and ease of reference in a laboratory setting.

The careful application of methods is potentially the most important step in the process of scientific inquiry. In the past, new methodologies led the way in developing new disciplines in the biological and medical sciences. For example, Physiology emerged out of Anatomy in the nineteenth century by harnessing new methods based on the newly discovered phenomenon of electricity. Nowadays, the relationships between disciplines and methods are more complex. Methods are now widely shared between disciplines and research areas. New developments in electronic publishing make it possible for scientists that encounter new methods to quickly find sources of information electronically. The design of individual volumes and chapters in this series takes this new access technology into account. Springer Protocols makes it possible to download single protocols separately. In addition, Springer makes its print-on-demand technology available globally. A print copy can therefore be acquired quickly and for a competitive price anywhere in the world.

Metabolomics was initially envisioned as an omics platform that would provide a snapshot of the entire metabolome. This vision has not been achieved since there is no single analytical platform that can monitor the wide diversity of chemical structures that compose the metabolome. As a result, metabolomics has evolved into a number of subfields that include lipidomics (see Volume 125 in this series), small molecule metabolomics, oxidative metabolomics, fluxomics, metallomics, and mass spectrometric imaging of small molecular weight metabolites and lipids.

In this volume, we will address the current status of analytical approaches utilized to sample defined molecular populations of metabolites via functional group derivatization, specialized chromatographic methods, and ionization techniques. All of these approaches require detailed experimental design to utilize the optimal methodology to address specific scientific questions. This is essential since many metabolites yield incredibly variable observations as a result of their rapid ongoing dynamics. Examples include rapid postmortem degradation (e.g., acetylcholine levels) and postmortem accumulation (e.g., GABA). Therefore, designing analytical platforms to monitor stable end products that are destined for excretion (e.g., dipeptides as biomarkers of protein metabolism and uric acid as an end product of purine metabolism), stable oxidized metabolites (e.g., isoprostanes), non-rate-limiting precursor pools, non-reutilized modified nucleosides as cancer biomarkers (e.g., 7-methylguanine), metabolites indicative of abnormal intermediary metabolism (e.g., ketoglutaramic acid as a biomarker of hyperammonemia), biomarkers of immune activation (e.g., kyneurenine and cyclic phosphatidic acid 16:0), biomarkers of ECM collagen degradation (e.g., deoxypyridinoline), inflammatory biomarkers of nitrosative damage (e.g., 8-nitroguanine), biomarkers of polyamine metabolism and diamine transporter function (e.g., putrescine), sulfur amino acid status in redox reactions (e.g., cysteine), biomarkers of uremia (e.g., guanidino acids), biomarkers of abnormal peroxisomal activity (e.g., dicarboxylic acid 16:0 and plasmalogens), and biomarkers of gut microbial metabolism (e.g., p-cresol sulfate).