Abujrais, Sandy, Vallianatou, Theodosia, Bergquist, Jonas · ACS chemical neuroscience · 2024 · DOI
Researchers compared blood chemistry between 38 people with ME/CFS and 24 healthy people to understand what might be different in their bodies. They found several chemical imbalances, particularly in how the body processes tryptophan (an amino acid) and in pathways related to energy production and inflammation. These differences suggest that ME/CFS patients may experience unusual immune activity and stress damage to their cells.
This study provides objective biochemical evidence that ME/CFS involves measurable metabolic dysfunction, potentially validating patient experiences and supporting the biological basis of the condition. Identifying specific metabolic abnormalities could eventually lead to biomarkers for diagnosis and targeted treatments.
This study does not prove that these metabolic changes cause ME/CFS symptoms or that correcting them will improve patient outcomes. The cross-sectional design only shows associations at a single time point and cannot establish causation or whether these changes are primary defects or secondary effects of the disease.
About the PEM badge: “PEM required” means post-exertional malaise was an explicit required diagnostic criterion for participant inclusion in this study — not that PEM was studied, observed, or discussed. Studies using criteria that do not require PEM (e.g. Fukuda, Oxford) are tagged “PEM not required”. How the atlas works →
The first block is for the primary paper and is the citation you should use in research work. The atlas-snapshot line only applies if you are specifically referring to this atlas’s reading of the paper on the date shown.
Primary citation
Abujrais, Sandy, Vallianatou, Theodosia, & Bergquist, Jonas (2024). Untargeted Metabolomics and Quantitative Analysis of Tryptophan Metabolites in Myalgic Encephalomyelitis Patients and Healthy Volunteers: A Comparative Study Using High-Resolution Mass Spectrometry.. ACS chemical neuroscience. https://doi.org/10.1021/acschemneuro.4c00444
BibTeX
@article{mecfsatlas-abujrais-2024-untargeted-metabolomics,
author = {Abujrais, Sandy and Vallianatou, Theodosia and Bergquist, Jonas},
title = {Untargeted Metabolomics and Quantitative Analysis of Tryptophan Metabolites in Myalgic Encephalomyelitis Patients and Healthy Volunteers: A Comparative Study Using High-Resolution Mass Spectrometry.},
journal = {ACS chemical neuroscience},
year = {2024},
doi = {10.1021/acschemneuro.4c00444},
note = {PubMed: 39302151},
url = {https://www.mecfsatlas.com/evidence/abujrais-2024-untargeted-metabolomics},
}Atlas snapshot reference
ME/CFS Atlas. Generator v1 / Scanner v1.4 / policy v0.1. Accessed 2026-05-29. https://www.mecfsatlas.com/evidence/abujrais-2024-untargeted-metabolomics
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