TraVis Pies: A Guide for Stable Isotope Metabolomics Interpretation Using an Intuitive Visualization

Area of Science:

• Biomedical research
• Metabolomics
• Systems biology

Background:

• Tracer metabolomics is crucial for understanding disease-related metabolic alterations.
• Interpreting tracer metabolomics data is complex, requiring analysis of metabolite abundance, tracer incorporation, and positional information.
• A structured approach is needed to assist researchers, especially those new to the field, in interpreting these datasets.

Purpose of the Study:

• To develop a structured and intuitive approach for interpreting tracer metabolomics datasets.
• To introduce a novel open-source tool to aid in the visualization and interpretation process.
• To provide guidelines for researchers to apply this approach to their own data.

Main Methods:

• Development of an intuitive visualization concept.
• Creation of a novel open-source software tool.
• Application of the approach and tool to a showcase tracer metabolomics experiment.

Main Results:

• The proposed visualization approach facilitates intuitive interpretation of tracer metabolomics data.
• The open-source tool effectively supports the visualization and analysis process.
• Demonstrated ease of understanding complex metabolic data for researchers using the new method.

Conclusions:

• The developed visualization approach and tool significantly ease the interpretation of tracer metabolomics data.
• This approach lowers the barrier for less experienced researchers to engage with complex metabolic datasets.
• The findings support the broader adoption of tracer metabolomics in biomedical research for studying disease mechanisms.