The study of metabolism in human health, disease, ageing, toxicology, microbiology and the environment is a significant research strength at the University of Birmingham. The university hosted the largest annual European metabolic profiling (metabolomics) conference, called Metabomeeting 2017, on 11-13 December 2017. The conference was organised by Rick Dunn and Andy Southam from the theme and was attended by over 190 scientists from the UK, Europe and beyond including Australia, Canada, Brazil and South Africa.
Over the three days more than 100 posters and over 20 oral talks were presented on diverse topics from dried blood spot collection and metabolite analysis, to how early primordial and non-enzymatic metabolic networks developed (Fe(II) is the key!) and finally to the importance of cell membrane transporters for drug import in to cells and the role of drug structure similiarity to natural product structures in defining drug import and drug resistance.
Of the many highlights of the conference the Beatles tribute band, The Cheatles, provided a new record for scientists dancing at a metabolomics conference!
