PhD - Doctor of Philosophy in Metabolomics By Research

Universiti Putra Malaysia (UPM)

Metabolomics is the study of low molecular weight molecules or metabolites found within cells and biological systems. It centers on eciphering the metabolome which is the complete set of metabolites expressed within an organism. The composition of the metabolome is a reflection of the networks of enzymatic pathways encoded within the genome. It also reflects the interplay of developmental processes and changing environment over the lifetime of the organism. The holistic nature of the metabolomics approach makes it invaluable for characterizing metabolic responses of an organism to perturbations. Due to this, metabolomics has exciting applications in various fields of research such as environmental interactions, bioenergy, functional genomics, secondary metabolism, systems biology and metabolic modeling in plant, algal, and microbial systems. Metabolites are conserved across various animal species, facilitating the extrapolation of research findings in laboratory animals to humans and thus clinical and translational research. Common platform technologies for measuring the metabolome include mass spectrometry (MS) and nuclear magnetic resonance spectroscopy (NMR), which can measure hundreds to thousands of unique chemical entities (UCE). Projects within the program focus on both agricultural (eg. agronomy, post-harvest, plant-pathogen interactions) and biomedical studies requiring metabolomics approach. Biomedical studies utilizing metabolomics at LHS focus on the interventions of selected plant extracts in establishing anti-diabetic, anti-obesity, antidiuretic/nephrotic and anti-cancer properties.