The objectives of the present study were to (1) examine the effects of the phenotypic factors age, gender and BMI on the lipidomic profile and (2) investigate the relationship between the lipidome, inflammatory markers and
insulin resistance. Specific
ceramide,
phosphatidylcholine and
phosphatidylethanolamine lipids were increased in females relative to males and specific
lysophosphatidylcholine,
lysophosphatidylethanolamine,
phosphatidylcholine and
phosphatidylethanolamine lipids decreased as BMI increased. However, age had a minimal effect on the
lipid profile with significant differences found in only two
lipid species. Network analysis revealed strong negative correlations between the inflammatory markers CRP, TNF-α,
resistin and MCP-1 and
lipids in the LPC, PC and PE classes, whereas
IL-8 formed positive correlations with
lipids from the CER and SM classes. Further analysis revealed that LPC a C18:1 and PE ae C40:6 were highly associated with
insulin resistance as indicated by HOMA-IR score. The present study identified
lipids that are affected by BMI and gender and identified a series of
lipids which had significant relationships with inflammatory markers. LPC a C18:1 and PE ae C40:6 were found to be highly associated with
insulin resistance pointing to the possibility that the alterations in these specific
lipids may play a role in the development of
insulin resistance.