[Research progress and application of shotgun lipidomics]

Following the rapid development of genomics, the omics studies on various metabolites have emerged, expanded, and fused into a novel area of metabolomics. The shotgun lipidomics, as an important approach to lipid researches, has demonstrated great potentials. It will play indispensable roles in biomedical research and applications as its associated techniques are further developed and advanced. Shotgun lipidomics utilizes the mass spectrum technologies to systematically analyze the full scope or a specific subset of lipids from biological samples to identify the differences and the associated functions and to explore the underling mechanisms. The bottleneck problem with the traditional lipid analyses was overcome by the strategy to adopt electro-spray mass spectrum principles, therefore led to a new era of lipidomic researches with high-throughput, high-resolution and high efficiency. The bioactive lipids include many species, widely distributed in living organisms, and closely related to human diseases. Shotgun lipidomics will facilitate the identification of disease-associated specific lipid markers, reveal their roles in the complex processes of the geresis and progress of diseases and eventually provide new strategies and approaches for its diagnosis and treatments.