Recent updates on diet-derived gut microbial metabolites

Emerging evidence indicates that the health-beneficial effects of ingested food components depend on in part, their upper and lower gastrointestinal uptake and metabolism and the gut microbial composition of the host. Several dietary components, such as polyphenols, are poorly absorbed in the upper intestinal compartments and extensively metabolized by the colonic microbiota resulting in the production of an array of metabolites. These microbiota-mediated products possess specific solubility, reactivity, bioavailability, and biological activities. However, identifying and characterizing a wide range of metabolites is challenging due to the high chemical diversity of dietary components and interindividual variability of the gut microbiota. It is, therefore, critical to design an animal model that effectively mimics human microbial metabolism and use multidisciplinary omics approaches such as metabolomics to detect and identify a wide range of metabolites. Here, we provide the current state of knowledge of major diet-derived gut microbial metabolites and their potential biological activities. After ingestion, dietary components such as soy isoflavone glycosides undergo upper intestinal hydrolysis and are extensively metabolized by the gut microbiota in the colon producing bioactive metabolites such as S-equol from precursor daidzin. image