Obesity and gut-microbiota-brain axis: A narrative review

Abstract

Introduction: Obesity is a major health problem that is associated with many physiological and mental disorders, such as diabetes, stroke, and depression. Gut microbiota has been affirmed to interact with various organs, including the brain. Intestinal microbiota and their metabolites might target the brain directly via vagal stimulation or indirectly through immune-neuroendocrine mechanisms, and they can regulate metabolism, adiposity, homoeostasis and energy balance, and central appetite and food reward signaling, which together have crucial roles in obesity. Studies support the concept of bidirectional signaling within the gut-brain axis (GBA) in the pathophysiology of obesity, mediated by metabolic, endocrine, neural, and immune system mechanisms.

Materials and methods: Scopus, PubMed, Google Scholar, and Web of Science databases were searched to find relevant studies.

Results: The gut-brain axis (GBA), a bidirectional connection between the gut microbiota and brain, influences physiological function and behavior through three different pathways. Neural pathway mainly consists of the enteric nervous system (ENS) and vagus nerve. Endocrine pathway, however, affects the neuroendocrine system of the brain, particularly the hypothalamus-pituitary-adrenal (HPA) axis and immunological pathway. Several alterations in the gut microbiome can lead to obesity, by modulating metabolic pathways and eating behaviors of the host through GBA. Therefore, novel therapies targeting the gut microbiome, i.e., fecal microbiota transplantation and supplementation with probiotics and prebiotics, can be a potential treatment for obesity.

Conclusion: This study corroborates the effect of gut microbiome on physiological function and body weight. The results show that the gut microbiota is becoming a target for new antiobesity therapies.

Keywords: gut-brain axis; obesity; prebiotic; probiotic; review.

FIGURE 1

Structure of the gut–microbiota–brain axis (The figure was adopted and reproduced from Liu et al. with permission from the publisher)

FIGURE 2

Association of obesity with gut–microbiota–brain axis (The figure was adopted and reproduced from Torres‐Fuentes et al. with permission from the publisher)

FIGURE 3

Association of probiotics and prebiotics with gut–microbiota–brain axis (The figure was adopted and reproduced from Liu et al. with permission from the publisher)