Metabolomics and natural deep eutectic solvents: Discovering a natural secret using an unbiased tool

The pool of metabolites of an organism or metabolome is the total end product of gene expression. The analysis of the metabolome should thus allow the chemical definition of the phenotype of an organism. In recent years, metabolomics, the youngest of the OMICS technologies, has developed into a widely applied natural product research approach. Because it aims at providing a comprehensive description of the metabolites present in an organism, its implementation far exceeds the mere collection of information about some metabolites, and is directed to the analysis of the entire metabolome, allowing correlations with other biological data provided by transcriptomics, proteomics, or physiological data. Thus, metabolomics, per se, is not a goal, but a tool to achieve the ultimate goal, which is a non-biased and non-targeted analysis of all metabolites in all types of living organisms, including plants. Basically, metabolomics experiments consist of five steps: preanalytical sample preparation or extraction, detection, multivariate or statistical analysis and identification of metabolites and finally, the interpretation or integration of obtained data to solve the metabolomic research question. Recent advances in analytical chemistry have brought us closer to achieve this final goal but because it is extremely ambitious, there is still a lot of room for improvement in the implementation of the method, e.g. increasing the efficiency of extraction, improving the time-space information of the metabolites and the identification of metabolites in the mixture. In this presentation, the challenges to be faced by metabolomics in the future will be addressed and feasible solutions for their approach will be discussed based on the recent results of our group. Additionally, one of the successful outcomes of the application of metabolomics, the discovery of natural deep eutectic solvents, a natural media alterative to water will be described together with their potential and applications in natural products research.