Metabolite profiling: from diagnostics to systems biology

Abstract
The concept of metabolite profiling has been around for several decades, but only recent technical innovations have allowed metabolite profiling to be carried out on a large scale - with respect to both the number of metabolites measured and the number of experiments carried out. As a result, the power of metabolite profiling as a technology platform for diagnostics, and the research areas of gene-function analysis and systems biology, is now beginning to be fully realized.