COLMAR1d: A Web Server for Automated, Quantitative One-Dimensional Nuclear Magnetic Resonance-Based Metabolomics at Arbitrary Magnetic Fields

The field of metabolomics, which is quintessential in today’s omics research, involves the large-scale detection, identification, and quantification of small-molecule metabolites in a wide range of biological samples. Nuclear magnetic resonance spectroscopy (NMR) has emerged as a powerful tool for metabolomics due to its high resolution, reproducibility, and exceptional quantitative nature. One of the key bottlenecks of metabolomics studies, however, remains the accurate and automated analysis of the resulting NMR spectra with good accuracy and minimal human intervention. Here, we present the COLMAR1d platform, consisting of a public web server and an optimized database, for one-dimensional (1D) NMR-based metabolomics analysis to address these challenges. The COLMAR1d database comprises more than 480 metabolites from GISSMO enabling a database query of spectra measured at arbitrary magnetic field strengths, as is demonstrated for spectra acquired between ¹H resonance frequencies of 80 MHz and 1.2 GHz of mouse serum, DMEM cell growth medium, and wine. COLMAR1d combines the GISSMO metabolomics database concept with the latest tools for automated processing, spectral deconvolution, database querying, and globally optimized mixture analysis for improved accuracy and efficiency. By leveraging advanced computational algorithms, COLMAR1d offers a user-friendly, automated platform for quantitative 1D NMR-based metabolomics analysis allowing a wide range of applications, including biomarker discovery, metabolic pathway elucidation, and integration with multiomics strategies.