Acupuncture modulates the gut microbiota in Alzheimer's disease: current evidence, challenges, and future opportunities

Long Yan; Hong Li; Yulin Qian; Qidi Liu; Shan Cong; Baomin Dou; Yu Wang; Meng Wang; Tao Yu

doi:10.3389/fnins.2024.1334735

Acupuncture modulates the gut microbiota in Alzheimer's disease: current evidence, challenges, and future opportunities

Front Neurosci. 2024 Mar 1:18:1334735. doi: 10.3389/fnins.2024.1334735. eCollection 2024.

Authors

Long Yan^#^{1

2}, Hong Li^#^{1

2}, Yulin Qian¹, Qidi Liu^{1

2}, Shan Cong^{1

2}, Baomin Dou², Yu Wang¹, Meng Wang¹, Tao Yu¹

Affiliations

¹ The First Teaching Hospital of Tianjin University of Traditional Chinese Medicine, Tianjin, China.
² National Clinical Research Center for Acupuncture and Moxibustion, Tianjin, China.

^# Contributed equally.

Abstract

Alzheimer's disease, one of the most severe and common neurodegenerative diseases, has no effective cure. Therefore it is crucial to explore novel and effective therapeutic targets. The gut microbiota - brain axis has been found to play a role in Alzheimer's disease by regulating the neuro-immune and endocrine systems. At the same time, acupuncture can modulate the gut microbiota and may impact the course of Alzheimer's disease. In this Review, we discuss recent studies on the role of acupuncture on the gut microbiota as well current challenges and future opportunities of acupuncture as potential treatment for the prevention and treatment of Alzheimer's disease.

Keywords: Alzheimer’s disease; acupuncture; gut microbiota; inflammation; probiotics.

Publication types

Review

Grants and funding

The author(s) declare financial support was received for the research, authorship, and/or publication of this article. This study was supported by the National Natural Science Foundation of China, Youth Science Foundation Project (No. 81704148), the Tianjin Postgraduate Research Innovation Project (No. 2020YJSB197) and the Tianjin Appropriate Technology Promotion Project for Chinese Medicine Rehabilitation Services. The funders had no role on the design of this study.