6 ms·

The author seems to be putting quite a bit of time into making these by hand. I wonder if it's possible to auto-generate these diagram/infographics for arbitrar

by cing 13y ago

The author seems to be putting quite a bit of time into making these by hand. I wonder if it's possible to auto-generate these diagram/infographics for arbitrary food items and ingredient lists using nutritiondata.com and chemical databases.

aroch 13y ago
Yes/No; you'd need to do extractions[1] and GC-MS[2] at the very least to get the possible compound list. Plant / animal tissue is fairly complex, and while we can guesstimate compounds and relative percentages there are some obvious issues with this if we want to use them as canon. [1]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Liquid%E2%80%93liquid_extraction https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Liquid%E2%80%93liquid_extracti... [2]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gas_chromatography%E2%80%93mass_spectrometry https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gas_chromatography%E2%80%93mas...
- Blahah 13y ago
  This has already been done, and is contained in the USDA nutrient database (http://ndb.nal.usda.gov/ http://ndb.nal.usda.gov/), among others.
  - aroch 13y ago
    I know...but this is not the same as being able to procedurally generate this for arbitrary samples
  - innguest 13y ago
    I'm an absolute layman when it comes to this subject, so forgive my verbosity and lack of proper terminology: When I clicked on that link and searched for "banana" and then clicked on "banana, raw", I was hoping to see a list of the scary-looking names I saw on the blog post that started this thread. I only see things I recognize. I think what would be cool/interesting (and I'm guessing what cing meant to say) would be if there were a way to get that list (the scary-looking one, not the vitamins and minerals one) from some procedure done to a vegetable. In that sense, the link you provided does not have the same information that the author of the blog post is (apparently) compiling by hand.
    - throwaway_yy2Di 13y ago
      "I think what would be cool/interesting (and I'm guessing what cing meant to say) would be if there were a way to get that list (the scary-looking one, not the vitamins and minerals one) from some procedure done to a vegetable.' It is currently not possible: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Metabolomics#Metabolome https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Metabolomics#Metabolome Found some papers on Google that try to find fractions of the metabolome -- in this one, the tomato: http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC1533921/ http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC1533921/ The identification of compounds, in particular secondary metabolites, through a metabolomic profiling approach encounters some major difficulties. First, the number of commercially available standards of secondary metabolites reported to be present in a specific plant species or tissue is low. Second, in an automated online separation, PDA detection, MS measurement, and/or MS/MS fragmentation of mass signals, it is difficult to meet optimized levels for all eluting compounds. Due to overlapping compounds, low intensity mass signals, or difficulties in the isolation of the mass signal for MS/MS fragmentation, the extraction of usable information for identification purposes can be complicated. Third, the lack of dedicated software and databases that integrate spectroscopic and MS data limits the identification procedure to a manual level. Nevertheless, by these means 43 metabolites could be readily assigned in the tomato fruit extract (Tables III and IV), leaving more to be identified. The total number of compounds detectable by our LC-MS system is difficult to calculate due to the presence of mass signals from isotopes, adducts, and unintended in-source fragmentation.

by cing 13y ago

aroch 13y ago

Yes/No; you'd need to do extractions[1] and GC-MS[2] at the very least to get the possible compound list. Plant / animal tissue is fairly complex, and while we can guesstimate compounds and relative percentages there are some obvious issues with this if we want to use them as canon. [1]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Liquid%E2%80%93liquid_extraction https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Liquid%E2%80%93liquid_extracti... [2]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gas_chromatography%E2%80%93mass_spectrometry https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gas_chromatography%E2%80%93mas...

Blahah 13y ago
This has already been done, and is contained in the USDA nutrient database (http://ndb.nal.usda.gov/ http://ndb.nal.usda.gov/), among others.
- aroch 13y ago
  I know...but this is not the same as being able to procedurally generate this for arbitrary samples
- innguest 13y ago
  I'm an absolute layman when it comes to this subject, so forgive my verbosity and lack of proper terminology: When I clicked on that link and searched for "banana" and then clicked on "banana, raw", I was hoping to see a list of the scary-looking names I saw on the blog post that started this thread. I only see things I recognize. I think what would be cool/interesting (and I'm guessing what cing meant to say) would be if there were a way to get that list (the scary-looking one, not the vitamins and minerals one) from some procedure done to a vegetable. In that sense, the link you provided does not have the same information that the author of the blog post is (apparently) compiling by hand.
  - throwaway_yy2Di 13y ago
    "I think what would be cool/interesting (and I'm guessing what cing meant to say) would be if there were a way to get that list (the scary-looking one, not the vitamins and minerals one) from some procedure done to a vegetable.' It is currently not possible: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Metabolomics#Metabolome https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Metabolomics#Metabolome Found some papers on Google that try to find fractions of the metabolome -- in this one, the tomato: http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC1533921/ http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC1533921/ The identification of compounds, in particular secondary metabolites, through a metabolomic profiling approach encounters some major difficulties. First, the number of commercially available standards of secondary metabolites reported to be present in a specific plant species or tissue is low. Second, in an automated online separation, PDA detection, MS measurement, and/or MS/MS fragmentation of mass signals, it is difficult to meet optimized levels for all eluting compounds. Due to overlapping compounds, low intensity mass signals, or difficulties in the isolation of the mass signal for MS/MS fragmentation, the extraction of usable information for identification purposes can be complicated. Third, the lack of dedicated software and databases that integrate spectroscopic and MS data limits the identification procedure to a manual level. Nevertheless, by these means 43 metabolites could be readily assigned in the tomato fruit extract (Tables III and IV), leaving more to be identified. The total number of compounds detectable by our LC-MS system is difficult to calculate due to the presence of mass signals from isotopes, adducts, and unintended in-source fragmentation.