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ORIGINAL RESEARCH article

Front. Aging Neurosci.
Sec. Alzheimer's Disease and Related Dementias
Volume 17 - 2025 | doi: 10.3389/fnagi.2025.1530046
This article is part of the Research Topic Blood, Cerebrospinal Fluid, and Vascular Biomarkers for Dementia View all 10 articles

Untargeted Urine Metabolomics Reveals Dynamic Metabolic Differences and Key Biomarkers Across Different Stages of Alzheimer's Disease

Provisionally accepted
Xiaoya Feng Xiaoya Feng Shenglan Zhao Shenglan Zhao *
  • Shandong Provincial Third Hospital, Jinan, China

The final, formatted version of the article will be published soon.

    Background: Alzheimer's disease (AD) is a progressive neurodegenerative disorder, with mild cognitive impairment (MCI) often serving as its precursor stage. Early intervention at the MCI stage can significantly delay AD onset. Methods: This study employed untargeted urine metabolomics, with data obtained from the MetaboLights database (MTBLS8662), combined with orthogonal partial least squares-discriminant analysis (OPLS-DA) to examine metabolic differences across different stages of AD progression. A decision tree approach was used to identify key metabolites within significantly enriched pathways. These key metabolites were then utilized to construct and validate an AD progression prediction model. Results: The OPLS-DA model effectively distinguished the metabolic characteristics at different stages. Pathway enrichment analysis revealed that Drug metabolism was significantly enriched across all stages, while Retinol metabolism was particularly prominent during the transition stages. Key metabolites such as Theophylline, Vanillylmandelic Acid (VMA), and Adenosine showed significant differencesdifferencesin the early stages of the disease, whereas 1,7-Dimethyluric Acid, Cystathionine, and Indole exhibited strong predictive value during the MCI to AD transition. These metabolites play a crucial role in monitoring AD progression. Predictive models based on these metabolites demonstrated excellent classification and prediction capabilities. Conclusion: This study systematically analyzed the dynamic metabolic differences during the progression of AD and identified key metabolites and pathways as potential biomarkers for early prediction and intervention. Utilizing urinary metabolomics, the findings provide a theoretical basis for monitoring AD progression and contribute to improving prevention and intervention strategies, thereby potentially delaying disease progression.

    Keywords: Alzheimer's disease, Mild Cognitive Impairment, Urine metabolomics, biomarkers, Key Biomarkers

    Received: 18 Nov 2024; Accepted: 09 Jan 2025.

    Copyright: © 2025 Feng and Zhao. This is an open-access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (CC BY). The use, distribution or reproduction in other forums is permitted, provided the original author(s) or licensor are credited and that the original publication in this journal is cited, in accordance with accepted academic practice. No use, distribution or reproduction is permitted which does not comply with these terms.

    * Correspondence: Shenglan Zhao, Shandong Provincial Third Hospital, Jinan, China

    Disclaimer: All claims expressed in this article are solely those of the authors and do not necessarily represent those of their affiliated organizations, or those of the publisher, the editors and the reviewers. Any product that may be evaluated in this article or claim that may be made by its manufacturer is not guaranteed or endorsed by the publisher.