New Computational Tool Provides 3-D Views of Molecular Processes Affecting Human Metabolism

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Study in a Sentence: Researchers recently created a novel virtual resource called Recon3D to provide biologists with 3-D perspectives of spatially linked genes, proteins, and metabolites for analyzing molecular processes affecting human metabolism. Recon3D is currently available online through two databases: BiGG Models and the Virtual Metabolic Human database.

Healthy for Humans: The tool can offer insights into the mechanisms of action for disease-related mutations and reveal how genes, proteins, and metabolic reactions respond to drugs. It has been used to analyze human sequencing data to map mutation hotspots in 3D as well as to show that drugs with different molecular structures can exert similar metabolic responses.

Redefining Research: This first resource of its kind provides the most comprehensive human metabolic map to date and accounts for 17 percent of the known functional genes in the human genome. It will help break research ground on the molecular mechanisms of human metabolism and offer a new human-based approach towards understanding diseases affected by metabolism.

Reference link: https://www.nature.com/articles/nbt.4072