ArticleNutrition & diabetes2021
Metformin alleviates choline diet-induced TMAO elevation in C57BL/6J mice by influencing gut-microbiota composition and functionality.
Article in Nutrition & diabetes, 2021. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Cited by 12 papers, 1 of them a synthesis that pooled it.
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The trial behind it
Trials whose registry record cites this paper, or whose number appears in the abstract. A trial that started after this paper was published is citing it as background, not reporting it.
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Who cites it
12 citing papers in PubMed, 1 synthesis or guideline pooled it, 24 citations in OpenAlex.
- Effects of prebiotics and phytochemicals on serum trimethylamine N-oxide reduction and gut microbiota: a systematic review and meta-analysis.Journal of translational medicine · 2025Pooled it
- Article
- Intervening at the microbial crossroads: targeting inflammation across the oral-gut-reproductive microbiome crosstalk in atherosclerosis.Antonie van Leeuwenhoek · 2026Review
- Trimethylamine-Annals of medicine · 2025Review
- Gut microbiota-derived TMAO drives the kidney-bone-vascular axis in chronic kidney disease complications.Renal failure · 2025Review
- From Gut to Heart: Targeting Trimethylamine N-Oxide as a Novel Strategy in Heart Failure Management.Biomolecules · 2025Review
- TMAO and diabetes: from the gut feeling to the heart of the problem.Nutrition & diabetes · 2025Review
- The microbial metabolite trimethylamine N-oxide and the kidney diseases.Frontiers in cellular and infection microbiology · 2025Review
- Metformin: Past, Present, and Future.Current diabetes reports · 2024Review
- A Metabolite Perspective on the Involvement of the Gut Microbiota in Type 2 Diabetes.International journal of molecular sciences · 2023Review
- Metformin: update on mechanisms of action and repurposing potential.Nature reviews. Endocrinology · 2023Review
- The role of the gut microbiota in health and cardiovascular diseases.Molecular biomedicine · 2022Review
Corrections and comments
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Authors and funding
7 authors at 1 institution in 1 country.
Funding
Abstract
Trimethylamine-N-oxide (TMAO), a gut-microbiota-dependent metabolite generated from its dietary precursors such as choline, has been identified as an independent risk factor for atherosclerosis. Metformin is the most widely used drug for the treatment of type 2 diabetes (T2D), which has therapeutic effects on hyperglycemia accelerated atherosclerosis. A growing body of evidence suggest that metformin plays a therapeutic role by regulating the structure and metabolic function of gut microbiota. However, whether metformin has an impact on gut-microbiota-mediated TMAO production from choline remains obscure. In this study, the oral administration of metformin significantly reduced choline diet-increased serum TMAO in choline diet-fed C57BL/6J mice. The diversity analysis based on 16S rRNA gene sequencing of C57BL/6J mice fecal samples indicated that metformin markedly changed the gut-microbiota composition. Metformin was positively correlated with the enrichment of different intestinal bacteria such as Bifidobacterium and Akkermansia and a lower cutC (a choline utilization gene) abundance. Furthermore, the ex vivo and in vitro inhibitory effects of metformin on choline metabolism of TMA-producing bacteria were confirmed under anaerobic condition. The results suggested that metformin suppresses serum TMAO level by remodeling gut microbiota involved in TMA generation from choline.
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Registered trials
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