REVIEW article
Front. Pharmacol.
Sec. Ethnopharmacology
Volume 16 - 2025 | doi: 10.3389/fphar.2025.1592524
The Role of Trimethylamine N-oxide in Disease Pathogenesis and the Therapeutic Potential of Traditional Chinese Medicine
Provisionally accepted
Zizhen Qin
Wanning WuXinyu YangXiao WangAnni DingYueyi HuangJiaxuan TangSiyuan JiangPeng ZhangChenwei QianXiangrui ZhangShihan ZhouYanqing WangZhouchenghao SongMinjie SunMinqiang Wang*
Shuang Shen*
Boran Zhu*- Nanjing University of Chinese Medicine, Nanjing, China
Select one of your emails
You have multiple emails registered with Frontiers:
Notify me on publication
Please enter your email address:
If you already have an account, please login
You don't have a Frontiers account ? You can register here
Trimethylamine N-oxide (TMAO), a metabolite derived from gut microbiota, has been implicated in the pathogenesis of various chronic diseases, including cardiovascular, digestive, neurological, and renal disorders. This review explores the complex mechanisms by which TMAO contributes to disease progression, including its role in inflammation, oxidative stress, and metabolic disorders. The study focused on the potential of traditional Chinese medicine (TCM) to regulate TMAO levels and mitigate its adverse effects. TCM interventions, through modulation of gut microbiota and inhibition of key enzymes like flavin-containing monooxygenase 3 (FMO3), offer promising therapeutic avenues. Despite the positive outcomes observed in preliminary studies, further research is needed to fully elucidate the mechanisms by which TCM interacts with TMAO and to establish its efficacy in clinical settings.
Keywords: Trimethylamine N-oxide, Gut Microbiota, chronic diseases, Traditional Chinese Medicine, Inflammation, Oxidative Stress, metabolic disorders
Received: 12 Mar 2025; Accepted: 07 Jul 2025.
Copyright: © 2025 Qin, Wu, Yang, Wang, Ding, Huang, Tang, Jiang, Zhang, Qian, Zhang, Zhou, Wang, Song, Sun, Wang, Shen and Zhu. 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:
Minqiang Wang, Nanjing University of Chinese Medicine, Nanjing, China
Shuang Shen, Nanjing University of Chinese Medicine, Nanjing, China
Boran Zhu, Nanjing University of Chinese Medicine, Nanjing, China
Disclaimer: All claims expressed in this article are solely those of the authors and do not necessarily represent those of their affiliated organizations, or those of the publisher, the editors and the reviewers. Any product that may be evaluated in this article or claim that may be made by its manufacturer is not guaranteed or endorsed by the publisher.