Nuclear magnetic resonance (NMR) is a special branch of spectroscopywhich exploits the magnetic properties of atomic nuclei for molecular elucidation andidentification. A technique that was initially developed to analyze chemical andphysical molecular structure is now widely used in medical diagnosis. The noninvasiveness,non-destructiveness and simplicity of sample preparation make NMR thepreferred technique for metabolomics study. Various body fluids such as urine, saliva,blood, plasma, serum and sweat have been explored to identify potential biomarkers ofdiseases. Psychiatric disorders, specifically alcohol-use disorder and neurologicaldisorders such as Parkinson’s disease, have been investigated with the aid of NMRspectroscopy. Cancer has been one of the most widely studied areas and the researchalso includes determination of biomarkers which not only could detect the presence ofcancer but also potentially predict the various cancer processes in cancer cell lines.Infectious diseases including the compounds produced by the microorganisms such asin tuberculosis and pneumonia have also been explored. Besides, NMR metabolomicshas also been used to establish a metabolic fingerprint for risk stratification and earlydetection of cardiovascular disease (CVD). The samples of subjects with the diseaseswere collected and the metabolites were compared against controls such as healthyindividuals using complex chemometrics and multivariate data analysis such asprincipal component analysis, partial least square and orthogonal partial least squareanalyses to distinguish the potential biomarkers. In terms of the various uses of NMRmetabolomics in the subject of diagnostic medicine, more improvements to overcomethe analytical limitations are expected, making it one of the most notable diagnostictools of the future. This chapter reviewed some of the published articles in cancer,psychiatric and neurological diseases to provide examples of using NMR spectroscopyin diagnosing human disorders.
Keywords: Cancer, Metabolomics, Neurological disorders, Nuclear MagneticResonance Spectroscopy, Psychiatric disorders.
