Clinical aspects of metabolomics

Clinical metabolomics using stable isotope tracing represents an important new approach to obtaining metabolic parameters in human subjects in situ. In this chapter, the considerations for such clinical metabolomics are outlined and discussed. Descriptions include the essentials of patient accrual, permission, and institutional review approvals as well as specifics of treatments, tissue and biofluid collection, and curation. Although procedures vary among Institutes, the basic features for clinical research are common. Here, we illustrate the process from concept to analysis with an example from a recent study on non-small cell lung cancer metabolomics. This powerful new approach has already provided important new insights into metabolic adaptations in lung cancer cells.