Advances in the application of <sup>13</sup>C stable isotope metabolic flux analysis on animal nutrition metabolism

<p indent="0mm">¹³C stable isotope metabolic flux analysis is a robust and efficient method that integrates isotope-labeled metabolite data with metabolic network models, employing advanced mathematical computations to accurately ascertain cellular and tissue metabolic fluxes. Although initially developed for applications in bioengineering and biopharmaceutical manufacturing, metabolic flux analysis based on ¹³C labeling has increasingly found broad utility in studying cellular, tissue, and systemic metabolism in mammalian physiology and pathology, driven by advancements in metabolomics detection technologies and computational biology. This review systematically elaborates on the fundamental concepts of stable isotope metabolic flux analysis and its methodologies for evaluating cellular metabolic fluxes, with a particular emphasis on the pivotal role of ¹³C metabolic flux analysis in uncovering metabolic intricacies and novel metabolic pathways. Furthermore, this review summarizes the applications of ¹³C metabolic flux analysis in nutritional fields such as carbohydrate metabolism, fatty acid metabolism, amino acid metabolism within mammalian models, with the aim of furnishing innovative technical support for mechanistic research into animal metabolic physiology.