MONITORING METABOLITE PROFILES DEPENDING ON AGING PROCESSES – METABOLOMICS APPROACHES

The phenomenon of used metabolomics approaches, especially nuclear magnetic resonance (NMR) spectroscopy, is not only about identification and quantification of all metabolites in biological samples, but also allows visualization of the actual metabolic state of living organisms studied at a particular point in time. This unique feature distinguishes metabolomics from other omics studies like genomic, transcriptomic, and proteomics. It is generally known that the metabolic coupling of astrocytes and neurons plays a key role in the phenomenon of plasticity of neural networks and the formation of memory tracks. Use of NMR method to analyze the image of the physiology of nervous tissue at different ages is quite attractive and the observed changes between chosen metabolites, in compared animal groups, may give new information about changes in cognitive abilities and the formation of new memory traces implicated with age.