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Review
. 2017 Nov 8:8:2146.
doi: 10.3389/fmicb.2017.02146. eCollection 2017.

Balancing Herbal Medicine and Functional Food for Prevention and Treatment of Cardiometabolic Diseases through Modulating Gut Microbiota

Ming Lyu  1   2 , Yue-Fei Wang  1   2 , Guan-Wei Fan  1   2   3 , Xiao-Ying Wang  1   4 , Shuang-Yong Xu  5 , Yan Zhu  1   2
Affiliations
Review

Balancing Herbal Medicine and Functional Food for Prevention and Treatment of Cardiometabolic Diseases through Modulating Gut Microbiota

Ming Lyu et al. Front Microbiol. .

Abstract

It has become apparent that gut microbiota is closely associated with cardiometabolic diseases (CMDs), and alteration in microbiome compositions is also linked to the host environment. Next generation sequencing (NGS) has facilitated in-depth studies on the effects of herbal medicine and functional food on gut microbiota. Both herbal medicine and functional food contain fiber, polyphenols and polysaccharides, exerting prebiotics-like activities in the prevention and treatment of CMDs. The administrations of herbal medicine and functional food lead to increased the abundance of phylum Bacteroidetes, and genus Akkermansia, Bifidobacteria, Lactobacillus, Bacteroides and Prevotella, while reducing phylum Firmicutes and Firmicutes/Bacteroidetes ratio in gut. Both herbal medicine and functional food interact with gut microbiome and alter the microbial metabolites including short-chain fatty acids (SCFAs), bile acids (BAs) and lipopolysaccharides (LPS), which are now correlated with metabolic diseases such as type 2 diabetes (T2D), obesity and non-alcoholic fatty liver disease (NAFLD). In addition, trimethylamine (TMA)-N-oxide (TMAO) is recently linked to atherosclerosis (AS) and cardiovascular disease (CVD) risks. Moreover, gut-organs axes may serve as the potential strategy for treating CMDs with the intervention of herbal medicine and functional food. In summary, a balance between herbal medicine and functional food rich in fiber, polyphenols and polysaccharides plays a vital role in modulating gut microbiota (phylum Bacteroidetes, Firmicutes and Firmicutes/Bacteroidetes ratio, and genus Akkermansia, Bifidobacteria, Lactobacillus, Bacteroides and Prevotella) through SCFAs, BAs, LPS and TMAO signaling regarding CMDs. Targeting gut-organs axes may serve as a new therapeutic strategy for CMDs by herbal medicine and functional food in the future. This review aims to summarize the balance between herbal medicine and functional food utilized for the prevention and treatment of CMDs through modulating gut microbiota.

Keywords: cardiovascular disease; functional food; herbal medicine; intestinal microbiota; metabolic disease.

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Figures

Figure 1
Figure 1
The potentially shared biological processes and underlying mechanisms of herbal medicine and functional food for CMDs through modulating microbiota.
See this image and copyright information in PMC

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