Publications by authors named "Suling Zeng"

Article Synopsis
  • The gut microbiota plays a crucial role in the onset and development of various human diseases, creating a complex interaction system related to intestinal health.
  • The article discusses difficulties in studying the gut microbiota's impact on digestive diseases like metabolic dysfunction-associated steatotic liver disease (MASLD) and inflammatory bowel disease (IBD).
  • It also highlights current treatment options (such as probiotics and fecal microbiota transplantation), new technologies (like gut microbiome-on-a-chip), and future research paths, emphasizing the need for ongoing testing of these approaches.
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The exponential rise in metabolic dysfunction-associated steatotic liver disease (MASLD) parallels the ever-increasing consumption of energy-dense diets, underscoring the need for effective MASLD-resolving drugs. MASLD pathogenesis is linked to obesity, diabetes, "gut-liver axis" alterations, and defective interleukin-22 (IL-22) signaling. Although barrier-protective IL-22 blunts diet-induced metabolic alterations, inhibits lipid intake, and reverses microbial dysbiosis, obesogenic diets rapidly suppress its production by small intestine-localized innate lymphocytes.

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Chronic liver disease and its complications are a significant global health burden. Changes in fungal communities (mycobiome), an integral component of the gut microbiome, are associated with and contribute to the development of liver disease. Fungal dysbiosis can induce intestinal barrier dysfunction and allow fungal products to translocate to the liver causing progression of disease.

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Article Synopsis
  • Ulcerative colitis is linked to irregular gut microbiota, and natural products like bergenin show promise in improving the condition by correcting this imbalance.
  • Research on mice indicated that bergenin reduced colitis symptoms by inhibiting certain pathways (TLR4, NF-κB, and mTOR) and altering gut bacteria composition, particularly affecting branched-chain amino acids (BCAA).
  • The study highlights that managing gut microbiota and BCAA levels could be crucial for developing treatments and preventive strategies for ulcerative colitis.
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  • Gut microbiota imbalances (dysbiosis) are linked to rheumatoid arthritis (RA) development, and Sinomenine (SIN) is a drug that helps treat RA and may influence gut microbiota.
  • Research explored how SIN affects gut microbes to ease RA symptoms, using techniques like gene sequencing and fecal microbiota transplants.
  • The findings showed that SIN helps restore healthy gut bacteria, particularly Lactobacillus, and increases beneficial metabolites, which together help improve RA symptoms by activating certain receptors in the body.
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Alcohol-associated liver disease is accompanied by intestinal mycobiome dysbiosis, yet the impacts on liver disease are unclear. We demonstrate that Candida albicans-specific T helper 17 (Th17) cells are increased in circulation and present in the liver of patients with alcohol-associated liver disease. Chronic ethanol administration in mice causes migration of Candida albicans (C.

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Article Synopsis
  • Gut bacteria convert tryptophan into metabolites like indole-3-acetic acid, which are often lower in patients with alcohol-related liver damage.
  • This study tested engineered bacteria (EcN-Ahr) in mice to see if they could produce these beneficial indoles and protect against ethanol-induced liver disease.
  • Results showed that EcN-Ahr helped improve liver health by activating immune responses, but this effect was lost in mice lacking specific immune receptors (Ahr) related to interleukin 22 production.
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Background And Aims: Patients with severe alcohol-associated hepatitis have high morbidity and mortality. Novel therapeutic approaches are urgently needed. The aims of our study were to confirm the predictive value of cytolysin-positive Enterococcus faecalis ( E.

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Chronic alcohol consumption is associated with intestinal fungal dysbiosis, yet we understand little about how alterations of intestinal fungi (mycobiota) contribute to the pathogenesis of alcohol-associated liver disease. By reanalyzing internal transcribed spacer 2 amplicon sequencing of fecal samples from a cohort of 66 patients with alcohol use disorder for presence (as opposed to relative abundance) of fungal species, we observed that the presence of Malassezia restricta was associated with increased markers of liver injury. M.

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Alcohol-related liver disease is a public health care burden globally. Only 10-20% of patients with alcohol use disorder have progressive liver disease. This study aimed to identify lipid biomarkers for the early identification of progressive alcohol-related liver disease, which is a key step for early intervention.

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RAR-related orphan receptor-γ (RORγt) is an essential transcription factor for thymic T cell development, secondary lymphoid tissue organogenesis, and peripheral immune cell differentiation. Serine 182 phosphorylation is a major post-translational modification (PTM) on RORγt. However, the in vivo contribution of this PTM in health and disease settings is unclear.

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Liver disease, a major cause of global mortality, has been associated with dysbiosis of the intestinal microbiota (bacteria, fungi, viruses, and other microbes). Studies have associated changes in gut bacteria with pathogenesis and severity of liver disease, but the contributions of the mycobiome (the fungal populations of the gut) to health and disease have not been well studied. We review recent findings of alterations in the composition of the mycobiota in patients with liver disease and discuss the mechanisms by which these might affect pathogenesis and disease progression.

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The link between gut microbiota and obesity or other metabolic syndromes is growing increasingly clear. Natural products are appreciated for their beneficial health effects in humans. Increasing investigations demonstrated that the anti-obesity bioactivities of many natural products are gut microbiota dependent.

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Complement receptor of immunoglobulin superfamily (CRIg) is expressed on liver macrophages and directly binds complement component C3b or Gram-positive bacteria to mediate phagocytosis. CRIg plays important roles in several immune-mediated diseases, but it is not clear how its pathogen recognition and phagocytic functions maintain homeostasis and prevent disease. We previously associated cytolysin-positive Enterococcus faecalis with severity of alcohol-related liver disease.

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Background: Alcohol-associated liver disease (ALD) is an important cause of morbidity and mortality worldwide. The intestinal microbiota is involved in the development and progression of ALD; however, little is known about commensal fungi therein.

Methods: We studied the dynamic changes of the intestinal fungal microbiome, or mycobiome, in 66 patients with alcohol use disorder (AUD) and after 2 weeks of alcohol abstinence using internal transcribed spacer 2 (ITS2) amplicon sequencing of fecal samples.

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Background & Aims: Fucosyltransferase 2 (Fut2)-mediated intestinal α1- 2-fucosylation is important for host-microbe interactions and has been associated with several diseases, but its role in obesity and hepatic steatohepatitis is not known. The aim of this study was to investigate the role of Fut2 in a Western-style diet-induced mouse model of obesity and steatohepatitis.

Methods: Wild-type (WT) and Fut2-deficient littermate mice were used and features of the metabolic syndrome and steatohepatitis were assessed after 20 weeks of Western diet feeding.

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Metabolic syndrome (MetS) is intricately linked to dysregulation of gut microbiota and host metabolomes. Here, we first find that a purified citrus polymethoxyflavone-rich extract (PMFE) potently ameliorates high-fat diet (HFD)-induced MetS, alleviates gut dysbiosis, and regulates branched-chain amino acid (BCAA) metabolism using 16 rDNA amplicon sequencing and metabolomic profiling. The metabolic protective effects of PMFE are gut microbiota dependent, as demonstrated by antibiotic treatment and fecal microbiome transplantation (FMT).

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The traditional Chinese medicine Citri Reticulatae Pericarpium (CRP) was mainly originated from the dried pericarp of Citrus reticulata 'Chachi' (Crc), Citrus reticulata 'Dahongpao' (Crd), Citrus reticulata 'Unshiu' (Cru) and Citrus reticulata 'Tangerina' (Crt) in China. Since these four cultivars have great similarities in morphology, reliable methods to differentiate CRP cultivars have rarely been reported. To discriminate the differences of these CRP cultivars, herein an efficient and reliable method by combining metabolomics, DNA barcoding and electronic nose was first established.

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Aurantii Fructus Immaturus (AFI) and Aurantii Fructus (AF) are two traditional citrus herbs with health-promoting and nutritive properties. This paper presents the first attempt to simultaneously investigate the absorption of five major flavanone glycosides, namely narirutin, naringin, hesperidin, neohesperidin, and poncirin, in rat plasma following a single oral administration of AFI and AF extracts to rats. The plasma concentrations were determined by liquid-liquid extraction followed by a rapid and sensitive ultra-performance LC-tandem mass spectrometry method.

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Background: Inhibition of pancreatic lipase is an attractive approach to the treatment of obesity and other metabolic disorders. Naturally occurring phytochemicals are promising sources of lipase inhibitors.

Purpose: In the present study, the anti-lipase activity of Citri Reticulatae Pericarpium (CRP) extracts was firstly evaluated in vitro.

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Detection of metabolites in complex biological matrixes is a great challenge because of the background noise and endogenous components. Herein, we proposed an integrated strategy that combined background subtraction program and modified mass defect filter (MMDF) data mining in a Microsoft Excel platform for chemicalome and metabolome profiling of the polymethoxylated flavonoids (PMFs) in Citri Reticulatae Pericarpium (CRP). The exogenously-sourced ions were firstly filtered out by the developed Visual Basic for Applications (VBA) program incorporated in the Microsoft Office.

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To get a better understanding of the bioactive constituents in Aurantii Fructus Immaturus (AFI) and Aurantii Fructus (AF), in the present study, a comprehensive strategy integrating multiple chromatographic analysis and chemometrics methods was firstly proposed. Based on segmental monitoring, a high-performance liquid chromatography (HPLC)-variable wavelength detection method was established for simultaneous quantification of ten major flavonoids, and the quantitative data were further analyzed by hierarchical cluster analysis (HCA) and principal component analysis (PCA). A strong cation exchange-high performance liquid chromatography (SCX-HPLC) method combined with t-test and one-way analysis of variance (ANOVA) was developed to determine synephrine, the major alkaloid in AFI and AF.

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In the present study, we developed and validated a rapid analytical method using high performance liquid chromatography coupled with quadrupole time of flight mass spectrometry (HPLC-Q-TOF/MS) to investigate the metabolic profile of Guge Fengtong tablet (GGFTT), a traditional Chinese medicine. The urine and bile samples were collected with 24 h after oral administration of GGFTT. A total of 34 compounds, including 11 parent compounds and 23 metabolites were unambiguously or tentatively identified.

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Quassinoids, the predominant constituents in the seeds of Brucea javanica (BJ), have gained an increasing interest over the past decades since the discovery of their extensive biological activities. In the present study, a method based on the segment and exposure strategy coupled with two mass spectrometer data acquisition techniques was firstly developed and validated for comprehensive profiling of quassinoids in the seeds of BJ via high-performance liquid chromatography tandem quadrupole time-of-flight mass spectrometry (HPLC-QTOF/MS). The segment and exposure strategy could significantly improve the detection efficiency for trace quassinoids in the seeds of BJ.

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Steroidal saponins, which exhibit multiple pharmacological effects, are the major bioactive constituents in herbal medicines from Dioscoreae species. In this study, a sensitive method based on high performance liquid chromatography-mass spectrometry (HPLC-MS) was established and validated for qualitative and quantitative analysis of steroidal saponins in four Dioscoreae herbs including Dioscoreae Nipponica Rhizome (DNR) and Dioscoreae Hypoglaucae Rhizome (DHR), Dioscoreae Spongiosae Rhizome (DSR) and Dioscoreae Rhizome (DR). A total of eleven steroidal saponins were identified by high performance liquid chromatography coupled with quadrupole time-of-flight mass spectrometry (HPLC-QTOF/MS).

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