The study of metabolism is not new. Researchers have been investigating the role of small-molecule metabolites such as sugars, lipids, and amino acids within cells and tissues for decades. In the 1920s, Otto Warburg, MD, PhD discovered that cancer cells alter their metabolism to increase glucose uptake for energy generation. The Warburg effect, as it became known, underpins modern imaging methods like positron emission tomography scans, which use radiolabeled glucose analogs to detect tumors.

The term metabolomics was coined more recently. Unlike genomics or transcriptomics, which describe potential or intermediate states, metabolomics reflects the real-time biochemical activity of cells.

“We need readouts of metabolites to really understand the almost instantaneous state of the cells, o

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