Efficacy of Triphala extracts on the changes of obese fecal microbiome and metabolome in the human gut model.

Abstract

Triphala is a mixture of tree fruits obtained from Terminalia chebula, Terminalia bellerica, and Phyllanthus emblica. It is one of the Ayurveda medicinal recipes used to treat health diseases such as obesity. The chemical composition analysis of Triphala extracts obtained from an equal portion of three fruits was performed. The contents of total phenolic compounds (62.87±0.21mg gallic acid equivalent/mL), total flavonoids (0.24±0.01mg catechin equivalent/mL), hydrolyzable tannins (177.27±10.09mg gallotannin equivalent/mL), and condensed tannins (0.62±0.11mg catechin equivalent/mL) were observed in Triphala extracts. The 1mg/mL of Triphala extracts was applied to batch culture fermentation which contained the feces from voluntarily obese female adults (body mass index of 35.0-40.0kg/m2) for 24h. The extraction of DNA and metabolites was each conducted on the samples obtained from batch culture fermentation within and without Triphala extracts treatment. The 16S rRNA gene sequencing and untargeted metabolomic analysis were carried out. There was no statistically significant difference between Triphala extracts and control treatments on the changes in microbial profiles (p-value <0.05). While the metabolomic analysis showed statistically significant differences of 305 up-regulated and 23 down-regulated metabolites in the treatment of Triphala extracts when compared with the control (p-value <0.05 and fold-change ≥2) belonging to 60 pathways. The pathway analysis revealed that Triphala extracts play an important role in the activation of phenylalanine, tyrosine and tryptophan biosynthesis. In this study, phenylalanine and tyrosine were identified metabolites which involve in the regulation of energy metabolism. The treatment of Triphala extracts possesses the induction of phenylalanine, tyrosine and tryptophan biosynthesis in fecal batch culture fermentation of obese adults and therefore it can be suggested as a probable herbal medicinal recipe for obesity treatment.