In an article published in Genome Medicine HPA related researchers have used advanced multi-omics analysis to investigate the impact of genetics and environment on the metabolic profiles of healthy adults by tracking metabolic changes over a two-year period.

Human metabolic profiles vary widely across individuals, shaped by genetics, lifestyle, and environmental exposures. These factors influence disease risk and progression in conditions like obesity, diabetes, and cardiovascular disease.

In this longitudinal study integrating genetic, lifestyle, and physiological data of 101 healthy adults aged 50-65, genomics, metabolomics, lipidomics, and proteomics was used to track metabolic changes over time and build an integrative protein-metabolite network.

The study identified 22 metabolites directly influenced by genetics, while lifestyle and environmental factors such as seasonal changes, smoking, stress, and weight fluctuations also had major impacts. In total 5,649 significant interactions were uncovered in the protein-metabolite network, most of which were connected to lifestyle and physiological conditions, while 87 were under genetic regulation.

Each participant exhibited a stable, personalized metabolic fingerprint, underscoring the concept of metabolic individuality. Further, plasma proteins emerged as especially powerful markers for tracking metabolic variability and predicting disease risk. These findings are thus very promising regarding metabolic health monitoring and developing future targeted interventions.

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