urea

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  • Name: urea
  • Description: Urea is a nitrogenous compound containing a carbonyl group attached to two amine groups, that has a role as a flour treatment agent, a human metabolite, a Daphnia magna metabolite, a Saccharomyces ... cerevisiae metabolite, an Escherichia coli metabolite, a mouse metabolite and a fertilizer. It is a monocarboxylic acid amide and a one-carbon compound. It derives from a carbonic acid. It is a tautomer of a carbamimidic acid. It is a highly soluble organic compound, with osmotic diuretic activity, formed in the liver from ammonia produced by the deamination of amino acids. It is the principal end product of protein catabolism and constitutes about one half of the total urinary solids. Urea is formed in a cyclic pathway known simply as the urea cycle. In this cycle, amino groups donated by ammonia and L-aspartate are converted to urea. Urea is essentially a waste product; it has no physiological function. It is dissolved in blood (in humans in a concentration of 2.5 - 7.5 mmol/liter) and excreted by the kidney in the urine. In addition, a small amount of urea is excreted (along with sodium chloride and water) in human sweat. Urea is found to be associated with primary hypomagnesemia, which is an inborn error of metabolism. Administration of urea elevates blood plasma osmolality, resulting in enhanced flow of water from tissues, including the brain, cerebrospinal fluid and eye, into interstitial fluid and plasma, thereby decreasing pressure in those tissues and increasing urine outflow. (HMDB0000294, DrugBank ID:DB03904, NCI Thesaurus Code:C29531, CHEBI:16199)
Overview of age-variations
Age group comparisons
PMID Age/Age interval, Gender Value (unit of measurement) Method Sample
18384253 Age 24.5 ± 3, Gender ⚥ 0.88 (mean value of the compound area) LC-MS; GC-MS plasma
18384253 Age 40.8 ± 5.6, Gender ⚥ 1.04 (mean value of the compound area) LC-MS; GC-MS plasma
18384253 Age 55.6 ± 3.7, Gender ⚥ 1.19 (mean value of the compound area) LC-MS; GC-MS plasma
27374292 Age [25–35] (median=32), Gender ♀ (Japanese) 0.888554 (average level of metabolite) UHPLC-MS/MS Positive mode serum
27374292 Age [55–65] (median=60), Gender ♀ (Japanese) 1.071592 (average level of metabolite) UHPLC-MS/MS Positive mode serum
Linear regression
PMID Age/Age interval, Gender Value (unit of measurement) Method Sample
log2 ratio/log2(FC)
PMID Age/Age interval, Gender Value (unit of measurement) Method Sample
Summary
  • Synonym:
    carbonic diamide; carbonyldiamide;carbamide; diaminomethanal
  • Chemical Formula:
    CH4N2O
  • Exact Mass g/mol:
    60.0323630
  • Systematic name:
    urea
  • SMILES:
    C(=O)(N)N
  • InChI:
    InChI=1S/CH4N2O/c2-1(3)4/h(H4,2,3,4)
  • InChI Key:
    XSQUKJJJFZCRTK-UHFFFAOYSA-N
  • CAS number:
    57-13-6
Related resources
Pathway info P = product of S = substrate of
Metabolite sources and localization
  • Metabolite location:
    Human organism, Body part, Human body biofluids, Biofluid tissues, Blood, Plasma, Cerebrospinal fluid, Breast milk, Saliva, Sweat, Urine, Organ, Kidney, Liver, Prostate, Skin, Tissue, Cellular (general class), Subcellular, Cytoplasm, Excreta material, Feces
  • Metabolite source:
    Homo sapiens, endogenous metabolite
Age-variations
Age group comparisons
Method: LC-MS; GC-MS
Sample: plasma
PubMed PMID: 18384253
Age group comparisons
Method: UHPLC-MS/MS Positive mode
Sample: serum
PubMed PMID: 27374292
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