Omics and Exercise: Global Approaches for Mapping Exercise Biological Networks

Abstract

The application of global "-omics" technologies to exercise has introduced new opportunities to map the complexity and interconnectedness of biological networks underlying the tissue-specific responses and systemic health benefits of exercise. This review will introduce major research tracks and recent advancements in this emerging field, as well as critical gaps in understanding the orchestration of molecular exercise dynamics that will benefit from unbiased omics investigations. Furthermore, significant research hurdles that need to be overcome to effectively fill these gaps related to data collection, computation, interpretation, and integration across omics applications will be discussed. Collectively, a cross-disciplinary physiological and omics-based systems approach will lead to discovery of a wealth of novel exercise-regulated targets for future mechanistic validation. This frontier in exercise biology will aid the development of personalized therapeutic strategies to improve athletic performance and human health through precision exercise medicine.

Copyright © 2017 Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory Press; all rights reserved.

Figures

Figure 1.

Omics and exercise research tracks. Eight major global omics-based research themes, or “tracks,” are depicted that can be applied to map various aspects of exercise biological networks and discover novel targets underlying exercise responses and training adaptations in health and disease (i.e., genome/epigenome, transcriptome, proteome, secretome, phosphoproteome, acetylome, metabolome, and lipidome). Although these research themes are depicted as distinct tracks and in no particular order, multidisciplinary omics data integration across these tracks will be critical to the identification and validation of novel exercise-regulated orchestration of targets within these networks.

Figure 2.

Omics and exercise schedule of events. The critical gaps in our understanding and range of variables associated with studying exercise in a global unbiased fashion are illustrated, which set the stage for the future exercise and omics field “schedule of events.” These events involve (A) exercise variables associated with establishing and comparing acute and chronic studies; (B) cellular and organ (e.g., skeletal muscle, adipose tissue, and heart) biological networks and the exercise-mediated cross talk between these pathways; (C) subject criteria considerations for studying human populations; and (D) subjects’ health, nutrition, training, and disease status that impact exercise biological networks. A detailed understanding of how each variable and network impacts systemic exercise responses will reveal how exercise interventions can be used to improve training adaptations and human health.

Figure 3.

Omics and exercise research hurdles. The challenges, or “hurdles,” associated with the development of multidisciplinary omics and exercise research projects are illustrated. These hurdles are associated with project design and establishment (i.e., subject recruitment, sample preparation, and instrumentation), data analysis and presentation (i.e., bioinformatics, interpretation, and visualization), and advancement of these data in the context of previous findings and experimental interrogation of novel exercise-regulated biological targets (i.e., integration and validation).