Julie Reed

Biology 1615
Summary of Article

Metabolites are very small signaling compounds in mammals that were studied.
These compounds tell our bodies to change and adapt, based on our needs. For
instance metabolites in a human body help us to use our leg muscles more than our
arm muscle, where in a monkey there arm muscles are greater than there legs. As a
consequence our physical appearance has changed as well. Humans have longer
more muscular legs than monkeys, therefore humans run faster, longer, and are
stronger in there legs. However, monkeys arms are stronger than humans, therefore
monkeys arms have more stamina, and muscles than human arms. This is an example
of how metabolites can change physical appearances (1).
To test the hypothesis that metabolites alter physical appearances, a series of
test were performed on humans, chimpanzees, rhesus monkeys, and mice. Then
researchers tested metabolite concentrations in three brain regions as well as the
kidney cortex and thigh skeletal muscle, then were evaluated using five different
methodologies which are gas chromatography-mass spectrometry, positive mode liquid
chromatography-mass spectrometry, negative mode liquid chromatography-mass
spectrometry, the tissue was measured using capillary electrophoresis-mass
spectrometry, and expressions of enzymes were measured using RNA-seq (2).
There were 10,615 detected metabolite peaks in the test results (2). These test
results showed significant concentration differences among tissues in 92% in the
metabolite peaks. 80% of the peaks showed significant concentration differences in
four species and 61% of the peaks were among primates (3). The largest proportion of


the concentration peaks were muscle, brain, and kidney specific. As the researches
study the metabolite concentration they found that the concentrations correlated with
the expression of genes that code for proteins. Because the correlation between
proteins and metabolites expressed functional properties in specific tissues including
muscle (3).
These results provided insights into the genetic differences that reflect
phenotypic differences among species. First the researchers learned indeed that
metabolite concentration in the human pre-frontal cortex (PFC) tissue are higher than in
the chimpanzee. From these results we learn that possibly because of the higher
amount of metabolites in the human brain correlates with the advanced function of the
human brain (5). Secondly the researchers found the metabolite concentrations are
greatly protected from environmental changes. Even with extreme climate changes
such as a drought, or extreme weather conditions, the metabolites remain unaffected
(5). Third the most surprising result was in the leg and arm skeletal muscle tissue. This
resulted in the discovery that the amount of metabolite concentration do not exactly
correlate with the advance functioning of those specific muscles among species (6).
The researcher hypothesized because humans have different muscle fiber types that
this may have been the reason why metabolite concentrations didnt correlate with the
advance function of the muscle tissues (6). However, the researchers were unable to
come up with a conclusion for muscle tissue metabolite concentration (6).
In conclusion, metabolite concentration and evolution among species do in fact
correlate with the physical appearance as well as the functions of the brain and how
advanced among species they may be.


Work Cited
Katarzyna Bozek, Yuning Wei, Zheng Yan, Xiling Liu, Jieyl Xiong, Masahiro Sugimoto,
Masaru Tomita, Svante Pbo, Raik Pieszek, Chet C. Sherwood, Patrick R. Hof,
John J. Ely, Dirk Steinhauser, Lothar Willmitzer, Jens Bangsbo, Ola Hansson,
Josep Call, Patrick Giavalisco, Phillipp Khaitovich
Exceptional Evolutionary Divergence of Human Muscle and Brain Metabolomes
Parallels Human Cognitive and Physical Uniqueness.
PLOS biology, www.plosbiology.com, May 2014, volume 12, issue 5, 1-14