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Updated: May 12, 2026

Multi-step Preparation Technique to Recover Multiple Metabolite Compound Classes for In-depth and Informative Metabolomic Analysis
Published on: July 11, 2014
Towards polypharmacokinetics: pharmacokinetics of multicomponent drugs and herbal medicines using a metabolomics
Ke Lan1, Guoxiang Xie, Wei Jia
1Key laboratory of Drug Targeting and Drug Delivery System of the Education Ministry, West China School of Pharmacy, Sichuan University, Chengdu 610041, China.
Abstract:
Determination of pharmacokinetics (PKs) of multicomponent pharmaceuticals and/or nutraceuticals (polypharmacokinetics, poly-PKs) is difficult due to the vast number of compounds present in natural products, their various concentrations across a wide range, complexity of their interactions, as well as their complex degradation dynamics in vivo. Metabolomics coupled with multivariate statistical tools that focus on the comprehensive analysis of small molecules in biofluids is a viable approach to address the challenges of poly-PK. This paper discusses recent advances in the characterization of poly-PK and the metabolism of multicomponent xenobiotic agents, such as compound drugs, dietary supplements, and herbal medicines, using metabolomics strategy. We propose a research framework that integrates the dynamic concentration profile of bioavailable xenobiotic molecules that result from in vivo absorption and hepatic and gut bacterial metabolism, as well as the human metabolic response profile. This framework will address the bottleneck problem in the pharmacological evaluation of multicomponent pharmaceuticals and nutraceuticals, leading to the direct elucidation of the pharmacological and molecular mechanisms of these compounds.
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