Dietary Garlic Prevents Development of Diabesity in Mice

Abstract

Garlic (Allium sativum) has been an important nutrient supplement worldwide for millennia but its various health benefits lacks a unifying mechanism. We found that dietary garlic can prevent the development of obesity and type II diabetes in a mouse model. Relative to the controls, which were obese and diabetic, garlic‐fed mice had normal levels of blood glucose, cholesterol, triglycerides, and lower levels of insulin (~15‐fold) and leptin (~7‐fold). Further studies demonstrated that garlic accelerated RBC turnover by shortening RBC half‐lives, and increased expression of splenic erythropoiesis and related genes to avoid anemia. The increased RBC degradation in the garlic‐fed mouse spleen induced heme oxygenase‐1 to generate more iron, bilirubin, and CO, a pleiotropic gasotransmitter. Thus, the various health benefits of garlic are the result of a biological amplification mechanism beginning with the formation of darkly‐stained RBC, through accelerated RBC turnover, and ending with the second messenger CO in a general homeostatic response to garlic's phytochemicals. We propose that garlic may serve as a natural remedy in the management of the diabesity epidemics through a combination of the energy‐intensive process of accelerated RBC turnover and the pleiotropic effect of heme‐derived CO. (Supported by NSC‐95‐3112‐B‐001‐011 and Academia Sinica, Taiwan)