The Immune System’s Defense System—Inflammatory Response

When inflammation happens in the body, certain substances are often released from the inflammation site and circulate in the bloodstream, thereby becoming biomarkers of the condition. Medical professionals can use blood tests to detect these inflammatory markers, also known as acute phase reactants, to detect inflammation. The most common inflammatory markers are C-reactive protein (CRP), erythrocyte sedimentation rate (ESR), and procalcitonin (PCT).³

However, these types of inflammatory markers can sometimes produce false alarms. This is because they are not very sensitive to detect serious underlying conditions, producing 85% false positive rate and 50% false negative rate.⁴ Research from the University of Bristol and the University of Exeter suggest that general practitioners should not use inflammatory markers to rule out diseases or for medical diagnosis.

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The Cannabinoids Targeted Panel measures 31 cannabinoids and related molecules. The sample preparation is customized to enrich these cannabinoids and related metabolites for much better detection than other methods can provide. Our validated method of cannabinoid detection and identification in human plasma samples helps you gain insight into the therapeutic potential of cannabinoids in key disease states such as chronic pain and neuro-inflammatory disease. Absolute quantification of these 31 cannabinoid metabolites provides deeper insights and detects known bioactive mediators of inflammation to enable you to gain insights into the metabolic consequences of these compounds.​

Fatty acids play many physiologically important roles in an organism. They are not only key metabolites of energy storage and production but also the basic building blocks of complex lipids that form cellular membranes. A variety of bioactive forms of fatty acid metabolites, known as lipid mediators, act as local hormones and are involved in many physiological systems and pathological processes. Free fatty acids (FFA, non-esterified fatty acids, NEFA) are the nonbound fraction of the total fatty acid pool. The determination of FFAs in plasma (or serum) is of clinical relevance as the association between FFAs and many diseases is well-known (eg, insulin resistance/type 2 diabetes, hypertension, cardiovascular disease).

The kynurenine pathway is a metabolic pathway leading to the production of nicotinamide adenine dinucleotide (NAD+) from the enzymatic conversion of tryptophan. Immune activation leads to the formation of kynurenine with corresponding loss of tryptophan.

The kynurenine/tryptophan ratio has been used to reflect the activity of the tryptophan-degrading enzyme indoleamine 2,3-dioxygenase (IDO) in cellular inflammatory response related to symptoms of depression, schizophrenia, and other neurological disease.