About the Authors

Karsten Suhre

karsten.suhre@helmholtz-muenchen.de

Affiliations Institute of Bioinformatics and Systems Biology, Helmholtz Zentrum München, German Research Center for Environmental Health, Neuherberg, Germany, Faculty of Biology, Ludwig-Maximilians-Universität, Planegg-Martinsried, Germany

Christa Meisinger

Affiliation Institute of Epidemiology, Helmholtz Zentrum München, German Research Center for Environmental Health, Neuherberg, Germany

Angela Döring

Affiliation Institute of Epidemiology, Helmholtz Zentrum München, German Research Center for Environmental Health, Neuherberg, Germany

Elisabeth Altmaier

Affiliation Institute of Bioinformatics and Systems Biology, Helmholtz Zentrum München, German Research Center for Environmental Health, Neuherberg, Germany

Petra Belcredi

Affiliation Institute of Epidemiology, Helmholtz Zentrum München, German Research Center for Environmental Health, Neuherberg, Germany

Christian Gieger

Affiliation Institute of Epidemiology, Helmholtz Zentrum München, German Research Center for Environmental Health, Neuherberg, Germany

David Chang

Affiliation Chenomx, Edmonton, Alberta, Canada

Michael V. Milburn

Affiliation Metabolon Inc., Durham, North Carolina, United States of America

Walter E. Gall

Affiliation Metabolon Inc., Durham, North Carolina, United States of America

Klaus M. Weinberger

Affiliation Biocrates Life Sciences AG, Innsbruck, Austria

Hans-Werner Mewes

Affiliations Institute of Bioinformatics and Systems Biology, Helmholtz Zentrum München, German Research Center for Environmental Health, Neuherberg, Germany, Department of Genome-Oriented Bioinformatics, Life and Food Science Center Weihenstephan, Technische Universität München, Freising-Weihenstephan, Germany

Martin Hrabé de Angelis

Affiliations Institute of Experimental Genetics, Genome Analysis Center, Helmholtz Zentrum München, German Research Center for Environmental Health, Neuherberg, Germany, Institute of Experimental Genetics, Life and Food Science Center Weihenstephan, Technische Universität München, Freising-Weihenstephan, Germany

H.-Erich Wichmann

Affiliations Institute of Epidemiology, Helmholtz Zentrum München, German Research Center for Environmental Health, Neuherberg, Germany, Institute of Medical Informatics, Biometry and Epidemiology, Ludwig-Maximilians-Universität and Klinikum Grosshadern, Munich, Germany

Florian Kronenberg

Affiliation Division of Genetic Epidemiology, Department of Medical Genetics, Molecular and Clinical Pharmacology, Innsbruck Medical University, Innsbruck, Austria

Jerzy Adamski

Affiliations Institute of Experimental Genetics, Genome Analysis Center, Helmholtz Zentrum München, German Research Center for Environmental Health, Neuherberg, Germany, Institute of Experimental Genetics, Life and Food Science Center Weihenstephan, Technische Universität München, Freising-Weihenstephan, Germany

Thomas Illig

Affiliation Institute of Epidemiology, Helmholtz Zentrum München, German Research Center for Environmental Health, Neuherberg, Germany

Competing Interests

This study was conducted under the direction of the Helmholtz Zentrum Munich - German Research Center for Environmental Health, independently of Biocrates, Chenomx and Metabolon, who provided the metabolomics measurements on a fee-for-service basis. HMGU researchers did not receive any financial advantages (e.g., consultancy fees) from any of these companies. Co-authorship has been offered to the following members of these companies solely for the value of their scientific input in the interpretation of the data, which was provided free of charge: David Chang, Chenomx Inc.; Michael V. Milburn and Walter E. Gall, Metabolon Inc.; Klaus M. Weinberger, Biocrates Life Sciences AG. This participation of authors from industry does not alter the authors' adherence to all the PLoS ONE policies on sharing data and materials. Moreover, none of the results presented in this work are presently under consideration for IP protection.

Author Contributions

Conceived and designed the experiments: KS HEW TI. Performed the experiments: DC MVM WGPD KMW. Analyzed the data: KS CM AD EA PB FK JA. Contributed reagents/materials/analysis tools: CG HWM MHdA HEW TI. Wrote the paper: KS CM AD FK JA.