Gut microbiome-oriented therapy for metabolic diseases: challenges and opportunities towards clinical translation

Abstract

Gut microbial changes have been causally associated with metabolic diseases, triggering huge interest in designing gut microbiome-based therapy. Here we discuss the open questions and challenges of translating ongoing gut microbiome-based intervention strategies to safe and efficacious clinical therapies. We also consider how the accumulating insights into host-microbe interactions in metabolic regulation could be harnessed as new dimensions to strengthen the translational prospect.

Keywords: clinical translation; drug discovery; gut microbiome; host–microbe interaction; metabolic diseases.