# HUBMet: an integrative database and analytical platform for human blood metabolites and metabolite-protein associations

## TL;DR

HUBMet is a new database and analysis tool for human blood metabolites and their connections to proteins, offering insights into disease mechanisms like in COVID-19.

## Contribution

HUBMet introduces a comprehensive database and four analytical modules for studying metabolite-protein associations and their biological relevance.

## Key findings

- HUBMet includes 3,950 metabolites and 129,814 metabolite-protein associations.
- The platform features four modules for enrichment, quantitative, tissue-specific, and network analyses.
- A case study on COVID-19 identified metabolic signatures linked to disease severity.

## Abstract

Understanding human blood metabolites is essential for deciphering systemic physiology and disease mechanisms, yet remains challenging due to diverse origins and dynamic regulation. In this study, we develop HUBMet (https://hubmet.app.bio-it.tech/home), an open-access web server that includes 3,950 metabolites and 129,814 metabolite-protein associations, with four analytical modules: Over-Representation Analysis (ORA) for enrichment analysis; Metabolite Set Enrichment Analysis (MSEA) for quantitative data analysis; Tissue Specificity Analysis (TSA) for assessing metabolite-tissue relevance; Metabolite-Protein Network Analysis (MPNet) for identifying key metabolite-protein associations and functional modules. HUBMet’s utility is demonstrated through a COVID-19 case study revealing metabolic signatures associated with disease severity.

The online version contains supplementary material available at 10.1186/s13059-025-03922-x.