The pathophysiology of irritable bowel syndrome and the detection of biomarkers of specific mechanisms and/or predictors of therapeutic response remain elusive. This roadblock reflects, in large part, the complexity and heterogeneity of the disorder. Recently, there has been growing evidence of a dietary and/or microbiome interaction with the host that may trigger symptoms in a subset of patients. While a number of techniques are available to examine these potential interactions, "omic" approaches such as metabolomics are becoming more widely used. Metabolomics measures hundreds and potentially thousands of known and unknown small molecule chemicals (metabolites) to provide a unique look into mechanisms that underlie symptom generation and potential predictors of therapeutic response. In this issue of the journal, Lee et al use nuclear magnetic resonance (NMR) to demonstrate the value of this approach to study IBS. This review examines the use of metabolomics to better understand IBS, focusing on what has been learned to date, practical and technical considerations, its potential for future research and how the study by Lee et al have contributed to these concepts.

中文翻译：

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代谢组学在肠易激综合征研究中的应用。

肠易激综合征的病理生理学和特定机制的生物标志物的检测和/或治疗反应的预测因子仍然难以捉摸。这一障碍在很大程度上反映了疾病的复杂性和异质性。近来，越来越多的证据表明饮食和/或微生物组与宿主的相互作用可能会触发部分患者的症状。尽管有许多技术可用来检查这些潜在的相互作用，但“组学”方法（例如代谢组学）正变得越来越广泛。代谢组学可以测量数百种甚至数千种已知和未知的小分子化学物质（代谢物），从而为构成症状产生的机制和治疗反应的潜在预测因素提供独特的视角。在本期杂志中，Lee等人使用核磁共振（NMR）来证明这种方法对IBS的研究价值。这篇综述检查了代谢组学的使用，以更好地理解IBS，重点是迄今为止所学到的知识，实践和技术方面的考虑，其在未来研究中的潜力以及Lee等人的研究如何对这些概念做出了贡献。