REVIEW article
Front. Cell. Infect. Microbiol.
Sec. Intestinal Microbiome
Volume 15 - 2025 | doi: 10.3389/fcimb.2025.1635638
This article is part of the Research TopicGut microbiome-driven Pathogenesis and Intervention Strategies in Liver DiseasesView all 3 articles
Gut Microbiota and Metabolomics in Metabolic Dysfunction-Associated Fatty Liver Disease: interaction, mechanism, and therapeutic value
Provisionally accepted
- 1Suzhou BOE Hospital, Suzhou, China
- 2Bengbu Medical University, Bengbu, China
- 3Suzhou Municipal Hospital, Suzhou, China
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The global epidemic of Metabolic dysfunction-associated fatty liver disease (MAFLD) urgently demands breakthroughs in precision medicine strategies. Its pathogenesis centers on the cascade dysregulation of the gut microbiota-metabolite-liver axis: microbial dysbiosis drives hepatic lipid accumulation and fibrosis by suppressing short-chain fatty acid synthesis, activating the TLR4/NF-κB inflammatory pathway, and disrupting bile acid signaling. Metabolomics further reveals characteristic disturbances including free fatty acid accumulation, aberrantly elevated branched-chain amino acids (independently predictive of hepatic steatosis), and mitochondrial dysfunction, providing a molecular basis for disease stratification. The field of precision diagnosis is undergoing transformative innovation—multi-omics integration combined with AI-driven analysis of liver enzymes and metabolic biomarkers enables non-invasive, ultra-high-accuracy staging of fibrosis. Therapeutic strategies are shifting towards personalization: microbial interventions require matching to patient-specific microbial ecology, drug selection necessitates efficacy and safety prediction, and synthetically engineered "artificial microbial ecosystems" represent a cutting-edge direction. Future efforts must establish a "multi-omics profiling–AI-powered dynamic modeling–clinical validation" closed-loop framework to precisely halt MAFLD progression to cirrhosis and hepatocellular carcinoma by deciphering patient-specific mechanisms.
Keywords: Metabolic dysfunction-associated fatty liver disease (MAFLD), Gut Microbiota, Metabolomics, Gut-liver axis, precision medicine
Received: 26 May 2025; Accepted: 07 Jul 2025.
Copyright: © 2025 Yang, Wang, Wang, Wu, Ji, Wang, Gu and Li. This is an open-access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (CC BY). The use, distribution or reproduction in other forums is permitted, provided the original author(s) or licensor are credited and that the original publication in this journal is cited, in accordance with accepted academic practice. No use, distribution or reproduction is permitted which does not comply with these terms.
* Correspondence: Hongwei Yang, Suzhou BOE Hospital, Suzhou, China
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