Description of Research Expertise

The Weljie Lab is at the forefront of understanding systems level changes in metabolism in a translational medicine context, particularly related to sleep and circadian rhythms. We are in the Department of Systems Pharmacology and Translational Therapeutics within the Perelman School of Medicine at the University of Pennsylvania. Our primary approaches use metabolomics technologies such as mass spectrometry (MS) and nuclear magentic resonance spectroscopy (NMR) for steady state metabolite measurements, stable isotope tracing of substrate metabolites, and MS imaging approaches using desorption electrospray ionization (DESI)-MS.

Metabolomics is a growing sub-field of systems biology centered on the study of small biological molecules in biological fluids and tissues. Recent research demonstrates that analysis of metabolite concentrations in living systems is useful in disease diagnosis, prognosis, and predicting drug efficacy in a personalized medicine context.

There is an intrinsic link between metabolism and function of the innate circadian clock system in numerous organisms and disease states, but the exact mechanism by which the clock controls mammalian metabolism is poorly understood. Our work seeks to fill this knowledge gap along with a particular emphasis on understanding the relationship of the clock with sleep, cancer and environmental health.