ArticleTrends in analytical chemistry : TRAC2024
A Reproducibility Crisis for Clinical Metabolomics Studies.
Article in Trends in analytical chemistry : TRAC, 2024. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Cited by 19 papers, 1 of them a synthesis that pooled it.
What it found
Each row is one number read from the abstract, on the scale the paper reported it, with its interval. Left of the dashed line favours the treatment, right favours the comparator. Under each row is the sentence it came from. New to these charts? A ten-minute tutorial.
The abstract states no effect estimate the extractor could read, or names no intervention and outcome on the map, so this paper lights no cell and moves no belief. It is still indexed, cited and linked below.
The trial behind it
Trials whose registry record cites this paper, or whose number appears in the abstract. A trial that started after this paper was published is citing it as background, not reporting it.
Neither the registry nor the abstract names a trial number. If this is a trial report, that itself is worth knowing.
Who cites it
19 citing papers in PubMed, 1 synthesis or guideline pooled it.
- A priori sample size determination and power analysis in metabolic phenotyping and integrative metabolomics: an application framework based on a systematic review of literature.Metabolomics : Official journal of the Metabolomic Society · 2026Pooled it
- Review
- Trends in Computational Metabolomics: A Perspective on Five Years of Software Development, Challenges, and Opportunities (2021-2025).Analytical chemistry · 2026Review
- Metabolomics of per- and polyfluoroalkyl substances (PFAS) exposure: Advances in LC-MS technology and applications.Journal of food and drug analysis · 2026Review
- Advanced technologies of single-cell metabolomics unveiling cellular metabolic heterogeneity for biological and biomedical research.Journal of food and drug analysis · 2026Review
- Analysis of purines and pyrimidines across biospecimens: influence of storage temperature and duration.Scientific reports · 2026Article
- A lipidomics roadmap: from basic research to societal challenges.Nature communications · 2026Review
- Integrated serum metabolomics and MRI biomarkers for MASLD: a practical framework for noninvasive staging and monitoring.Abdominal radiology (New York) · 2026Review
- Beyond Feature Selection: Interpretable Machine Learning for Mechanistic Insights in Metabolomics.Biology · 2026Review
- Tracking the Metabolites of Health and Disease Using Artificial Intelligence.Diseases (Basel, Switzerland) · 2026Review
- Receptor-Mitochondria Crosstalk in the Kynurenine Metabolic Pathway: Integrating Metabolomics and Clinical Mass Spectrometry.Antioxidants (Basel, Switzerland) · 2026Review
- High-Grade Serous Ovarian Carcinoma in the Genomics Era: Current Applications, Challenges and Future Directions.International journal of molecular sciences · 2026Review
- Knowledge Mapping of Human Genetic Variation in Multiomics Biomarker Translation: A Bibliometric Analysis.Human mutation · 2026Article
- A repository of the salivary metabolome and its key drivers in 1436 European children.EBioMedicine · 2025Article
- Harnessing Metabolomics to Advance Nutrition-Based Therapeutics for Inflammation: A Systematic Review of Randomized Clinical Trials.Metabolites · 2025Review
- Securing the Future of NMR Metabolomics Reproducibility: A Call for Standardized Reporting.Analytical chemistry · 2025Review
- Recommendations for sample selection, collection and preparation for NMR-based metabolomics studies of blood.Metabolomics : Official journal of the Metabolomic Society · 2025Review
- Reference Intervals of Serum Metabolites and Lipids of a Healthy Chinese Population Determined by Liquid Chromatography-Mass Spectrometry.Metabolites · 2025Article
- Plasma metabolomic analysis in Thai EGFR-mutated non-small cell lung cancer patients.Computational and structural biotechnology journal · 2025Article
Corrections and comments
PubMed lists nothing against this paper. Absence here is not a guarantee, only a check that was made.
Authors and funding
6 authors.
Funding
Abstract
Cancer is a leading cause of world-wide death and a major subject of clinical studies focused on the identification of new diagnostic tools. An in-depth meta-analysis of 244 clinical metabolomics studies of human serum samples highlights a reproducibility crisis. A total of 2,206 unique metabolites were reported as statistically significant across the 244 studies, but 72% (1,582) of these metabolites were identified by only one study. Further analysis shows a random disparate disagreement in reported directions of metabolite concentration changes when detected by multiple studies. Statistical models revealed that 1,867 of the 2,206 metabolites (85%) are simply statistical noise. Only 3 to 12% of these metabolites reach the threshold of statistical significance for a specific cancer type. Our findings demonstrate the absence of a detectable metabolic response to cancer and provide evidence of a serious need by the metabolomics community to establish widely accepted best practices to improve future outcomes.
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What OpenQuestion holds
Registered trials
Read under generation 80e0d062 · epoch 390. Bibliography from PubMed, PubMed Central and OpenAlex; grants from NIH RePORTER; trial links from ClinicalTrials.gov; estimates, votes and beliefs from the OpenQuestion graph.