Abstract
The concept of a system biology approach to understanding biological functions such as the development and the progression of chronic diseases and drug-induced toxicity in humans has generated widespread interest in the pharmaceutical community. Techniques including genomics, transcriptomics, proteomics, peptidomics, lipidomics and metabolomics are being integrated not only to understand the entire biological system but also to discover novel biomarkers. Analytical “Xomics” assays are playing a major role in the development of these methods. We will review some of these analytical techniques and specifically focus on chromatography mass spectrometry based metabonomic strategies applied to diverse areas such as fermentation, bacteria, plants and animals.