Untargeted Metabolomics Are Not Useful in the Risk Assessment of GM Crops

In a recent manuscript in Trends in Plant Science, Christ et al. proposed that untargeted metabolomics be considered for improving the risk assessment of crops produced through agricultural biotechnology [ 1 Christ B. et al. Contribution of untargeted metabolomics for future assessment of biotech crops. Trends Plant Sci. 2018; 23 : 1047-1056 Abstract Full Text Full Text PDF PubMed Scopus (1) Google Scholar ]. The proposal to incorporate untargeted metabolomics to characterize genetically modified (GM) crops is not novel [ 2 Heinemann J.A. et al. Molecular profiling – a tool for addressing emerging gaps in the comparative risk assessment of GMOs. Environ. Int. 2011; 37 : 1285-1293 Crossref PubMed Scopus (25) Google Scholar , 3 Simó C. et al. Metabolomics of genetically modified crops. Int. J. Mol. Sci. 2014; 15 : 18941-18966 Crossref PubMed Scopus (34) Google Scholar ]. As explained by the authors, the timing for this recommendation comes as products developed with newer technologies such as CRISPR/Cas are being brought to market