Compartment-Specific Amino Acid Dysregulation in Depression: Integrating Non-Targeted Metabolomics with Brain Barrier Biology
- 1Department of Molecular Biology and Endocrinology, Vinča Institute of Nuclear Sciences—National Institute of the Republic of Serbia, University of Belgrade, Mike Petrovića Alasa 12-14, 11351 Belgrade, Serbia
Abstract
The introduction of metabolomics into depression research, together with advances in bioinformatics, has substantially expanded our understanding of molecular alterations associated with this disorder. However, the rapid growth of metabolomic studies, combined with variability in analytical workflows, biological matrices, and experimental models, presents major challenges for data interpretation and cross-study integration. In this article, we systematically summarized reported metabolite alterations in human and animal studies using a combined natural language processing (NLP)-based text-mining and vote-counting approach. To our knowledge, this is one of the first studies to apply NLP-based abstract mining to depression-related metabolomics literature across multiple biological compartments. Text-mining analysis of publications retrieved from PubMed and Scopus identified proteinogenic amino acids as the most consistently reported class of altered metabolites across peripheral and central matrices, followed by lipids and other metabolic categories. Vote-counting analysis of non-targeted metabolomics studies revealed relatively consistent decreases in circulating large neutral and branched-chain amino acids, with Leu, Met, Trp, Tyr, and Val representing the most consistently overlapping alterations across human and animal studies. Finally, these findings were discussed in the context of brain barrier transport systems, considering altered metabolite exchange across the blood–brain interfaces as one of several possible explanations for the compartment-specific amino acid alterations observed in depression.
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BibTeX
@article{peric2026compartmentspecific,
title = {{Compartment-Specific Amino Acid Dysregulation in Depression: Integrating Non-Targeted Metabolomics with Brain Barrier Biology}},
author = {Ivana Perić and Andrijana Stanisavljević Ilić and Neda Đorđević and Nevena Todorović Vukotić},
journal = {International Journal of Molecular Sciences},
year = {2026},
month = nov,
doi = {10.3390/ijms27219847},
url = {https://www.mdpi.com/1422-0067/27/21/9847},
note = {CC BY 4.0},
}
RIS
TY - JOUR
TI - Compartment-Specific Amino Acid Dysregulation in Depression: Integrating Non-Targeted Metabolomics with Brain Barrier Biology
AU - Ivana Perić
AU - Andrijana Stanisavljević Ilić
AU - Neda Đorđević
AU - Nevena Todorović Vukotić
PY - 2026
DA - 2026/11/03
JO - International Journal of Molecular Sciences
DO - 10.3390/ijms27219847
UR - https://www.mdpi.com/1422-0067/27/21/9847
AB - The introduction of metabolomics into depression research, together with advances in bioinformatics, has substantially expanded our understanding of molecular alterations associated with this disorder. However, the rapid growth of metabolomic studies, combined with variability in analytical workflows, biological matrices, and experimental models, presents major challenges for data interpretation and cross-study integration. In this article, we systematically summarized reported metabolite alterations in human and animal studies using a combined natural language processing (NLP)-based text-mining and vote-counting approach. To our knowledge, this is one of the first studies to apply NLP-based abstract mining to depression-related metabolomics literature across multiple biological compartments. Text-mining analysis of publications retrieved from PubMed and Scopus identified proteinogenic amino acids as the most consistently reported class of altered metabolites across peripheral and central matrices, followed by lipids and other metabolic categories. Vote-counting analysis of non-targeted metabolomics studies revealed relatively consistent decreases in circulating large neutral and branched-chain amino acids, with Leu, Met, Trp, Tyr, and Val representing the most consistently overlapping alterations across human and animal studies. Finally, these findings were discussed in the context of brain barrier transport systems, considering altered metabolite exchange across the blood–brain interfaces as one of several possible explanations for the compartment-specific amino acid alterations observed in depression.
SN - 1422-0067
ER -