Alcohol extract of North American ginseng (Panax quinquefolius) reduces fatty liver, dyslipidemia, and other complications of metabolic syndrome in a mouse model

Abstract

We investigated whether North American ginseng (Panax quinquefolius) could reduce development of the metabolic syndrome phenotype in a mouse model (ETKO) of the disease. Young ETKO mice have no disease but similar to humans start to develop the fatty liver, hypertriglyceridemia, obesity, and insulin resistance at 25-30 weeks of age, and the disease continues to progress with ageing. ETKO mice were orally given an ethanol extract of ginseng roots at 4 and 32 weeks of age. Treatments with ginseng eliminated the ETKO fatty liver, reduced hepatic and intestinal lipoprotein secretion, and reduced the level of circulating lipids. Improvements by ginseng treatments were manifested as a reduction in the expression of genes involved in the regulation of fatty acid and triglyceride (fat) synthesis and secretion by the lipoproteins on one hand, and the stimulation of fatty acid oxidation and triglyceride degradation by lipolysis on the other hand. These processes altogether improved glucose, fatty acid, and triglyceride metabolism, reduced liver fat load, and reversed the progression of metabolic syndrome. These data confirm that treatments with North American ginseng could alleviate metabolic syndrome through the maintenance of a better balance between glucose and fatty acid metabolism, lipoprotein secretion, and energy homeostasis in disease-prone states.

Herbal Medicine for Cardiovascular Diseases: Efficacy, Mechanisms, and Safety

“…VSMC, vascular smooth muscle cell; ECM, extracellular matrix; EC, endothelial cell; NO, nitric oxide; PPARY, peroxisome proliferator-activated receptor-gamma. By decreasing VEGF-A and FGF-2 levels (Kim et al, 1999b;Keum et al, 2003;Park et al, 2005;Persson et al, 2006;Shin Y. et al, 2013;Deng et al, 2017;Singh et al, 2017;Lee et al, 2019a) Gingko By decreasing caspase 3 and pro-apoptotic Bax expression and increasing anti-apoptotic Bcl-2 expression (Akiba et al, 2007;Lin et al, 2007;Mansour et al, 2011;Liu et al, 2013;Liou et al, 2015;Mesquita et al, 2017;Abdel-Zaher et al, 2018;Huang et al, 2018;Chen et al, 2019).…”

“…Ginseng's beneficial effects on lipid metabolism have been described more than three decades ago (Qureshi et al, 1983;Yamamoto et al, 1983). In humans and rats, red Ginseng supplementation improves lipid profiles by diminishing the total plasma levels of cholesterol, triglycerides, LDL-C, free fatty acids (FFA), and platelet adhesiveness and increasing HDL-C levels in total plasma (Deng et al, 2017;Singh et al, 2017). In rats, black Ginseng can ameliorate hypercholesterolemia by interfering with the expression of cholesterol metabolism genes (Saba et al, 2016).…”

Positive influence of gut microbiota on the effects of Korean red ginseng in metabolic syndrome: a randomized, double-blind, placebo-controlled clinical trial

“…In parallel, growing evidence suggests that KRG is a potent therapeutic agent against MS disorders, including obesity, dyslipidemia, diabetes, and CVD [39]. For example, in vivo studies using rat and mouse models reported that ginseng or its components improved the glucose and lipid metabolism in MS [42][43][44][45]. Furthermore, our earlier clinical studies on South Korean obese women showed that a KRG treatment reduced the weight, BMI, waist-hip ratio, daily food intake, the Korean version of obesity-related quality of life scale [46,47].…”

The effects of ginseng on the metabolic syndrome: An updated review

“…Moreover, ginseng reduced the expression of genes involved in the adjustment of fatty acid and triglyceride secretion by the lipoproteins. On the other hand, ginseng stimulated lipolysis (Singh et al., 2017 ). The protective effects of ginseng on dyslipidemia may be related to the increased phosphorylation of AMP‐activated protein kinase (AMPK) and acetyl‐CoA carboxylase.…”