Synthesis-driven reverse metabolomics reveals 3-hydroxy N-acyl amides as gut microbial molecules.

Synthesis-driven reverse metabolomics identified over 400 3-hydroxy N-acyl amides across diverse biological samples, revealing their widespread presence and potential biological roles.

• Why it matters: Understanding microbe-host interactions and their metabolites is crucial for insights into human health and disease, yet many microbial metabolites remain unannotated due to limited spectral references.
• What they did: Researchers synthesized a spectral library of 436 diverse 3-hydroxy N-acyl amides and applied reverse metabolomics to match these in over 54,000 public datasets, confirming their presence in human saliva, stool, and skin.
• The result: The study uncovered 161,626 spectral matches, including 334 novel molecules, and demonstrated microbial production of some metabolites, highlighting their relevance in human metabolism and disease modulation.