Rats’ Metabolic Responses to Chronic Intervention with Cantonese Herbal Tea

Abstract

Cantonese Herbal Tea (CHT) is consumed in south China to alleviate feelings of discomfort due to the over-heat and humidity in the body, but the related molecular mechanisms behind its effects remain obscure. The urinary metabolic responses to CHT over time in rats were investigated during a 38-day-period using GC-MS-based metabonomics. Integrated with student's t-test and Orthogonal Projection on Latent Structures Discriminant Analysis (OPLS-DA) at each time point revealed that the process could be divided into two stages. In the first stage, the bioefficacy was characterized by elevated antioxidant activity and the depletion of oxidative stresses. However, the effect was reduced with time and replaced by a second stage characterized by the decreased flow of energy metabolism and an imbalance in gut microbiota. In conclusion, metabonomics study gained insight into the metabolic changes induced by CHT intake and the extent to which CHT intake influences the urinary metabolome, which also provides a powerful method for understanding the mechanism of CHT.