Researchers at the University of Galway developed digital babies to better understand infants’ health throughout their vital first 180 days of life. The researchers developed 360 powerful computer models to recreate each baby’s unique metabolic processes.
The digital babies are the first sex-specific computational whole-body models of newborn and baby metabolism, comprising 26 organs, six cell types, and over 80,000 metabolic processes. Real-life data from 10,000 infants, including sex, birth weight, and metabolite concentrations, were used to create and validate the models, which may be personalized, allowing scientists to study an individual infant’s metabolism for precision medical applications.
Professor Ines Thiele, chief investigator of APC Microbiome Ireland, headed a team of scientists from the University of Galway’s Digital Metabolic Twin Centre and Heidelberg University.
The team’s study aims to improve precision medicine through computational modelling.
They define computer modeling of babies as essential because it improves understanding of infant metabolism and opens up new avenues for improving the diagnosis and treatment of medical issues throughout a baby’s early life, such as hereditary metabolic illnesses. The investigation was led by the University of Galway and done in partnership with Heidelberg University, Heidelberg Institute for Theoretical Studies, and Heidelberg University Hospital in Germany.
Lead scientist Elaine Zaunseder of Heidelberg University stated that babies are more than just miniature people; they have distinct metabolic characteristics that allow them to develop and grow properly. “For instance, babies need more energy for regulating body temperature due to, for example, their high surface-area-to-mass ratio, but they cannot shiver in the first six months of life, so metabolic processes must ensure the infant keeps warm,” she stated.
“As a result, identifying these metabolic processes and translating them into mathematical notions that could be used in the computer model was a critical component of this research.
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