Integrative Metabolomics and Exposomics Study of Severe Asthma in Adults

2019 Fiscal Year Final Research Report

• Project/Area Number: 19K21239
• Project/Area Number (Other): 18H06121 (2018)
• Research Category: Grant-in-Aid for Research Activity Start-up
• Allocation Type: Multi-year Fund (2019); Single-year Grants (2018)
• Review Section: 0802:Biomedical structure and function and related fields
• Research Institution: Gunma University
• Principal Investigator: ZHANG PEI 群馬大学, 未来先端研究機構, 研究員 (30820683)
• Project Period (FY): 2018-08-24 – 2020-03-31
• Keywords: Asthma / Metabolomics / Lipidomics

Outline of Final Research Achievements

In this project, automated blood sample preparation platforms on cohort level (> 1,000 samples) were established and incorporated into the existing untargeted metabolomics/lipidomics workflow. The methods are very robust with coefficient variance of internal standards in quality control samples below 10%. Utilizing the established workflow, molecular phenotyping of severe asthma was conducted. Untargeted metabolomics and lipidomics as well as targeted sphingolipids measurements were performed on 570 severe asthmatics and 570 controls. Although data analysis is still ongoing, preliminary results showed that many metabolites in severe asthma were disregulated compared to controls, for example, cortisol was down-regulated in asthmatics, sphingosine, taurine and sphingosine-1-phosphate increased in asthmatics.
Results from this project could benefit illustration of the molecular mechanism of severe asthma and contribute to new drug target discovery of severe asthma.

Free Research Field

生体の 構造と 機能お よ び そ の 関連分野

Academic Significance and Societal Importance of the Research Achievements

Asthma is a chronic inflammatory disease that affects over 300 million people worldwide, which makes it a both financial and medical burden for many countries. Understanding the molecular mechanism of this disease is of critical importance for the discovery of potential treatment targets.