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Clinical Studies and Practice

Tannerella forsythia and coating color on the tongue dorsum, and fatty food liking associate with fat accumulation and insulin resistance in adult catch-up fat

International Journal of Obesity volume 42, pages 121–128 (2018)Cite this article

Subjects

Abstract

Background/Objectives:

We aimed to determine the alteration of Tannerella forsythia and coating color on the dorsal tongue, and fatty food liking in catch-up fat in adult (CUFA), as well as the probable associations between fat accumulation, insulin resistance (IR) and these changes.

Subjects/Methods:

T. forsythia on the tongue dorsum, fatty food liking, fat accumulation and insulin sensitivity were investigated in CUFA humans and rats, and tongue-coating color was observed in CUFA individuals. We further determined the changes of fatty food liking, fat accumulation and IR in T. forsythia-infected rodents by oral lavage.

Results:

Increases in fat accumulation, IR, percentage of subjects with yellow tongue coating and that with T. forsythia detected were observed in CUFA individuals. Additionally, the fat ranking scores were significantly lower and the hedonic ratings of low-fat options of sampled food were lower, while the ratings of high-fat options were remarkably higher in CUFA subjects. Additionally, T. forsythia level elevated in CUFA rats, and fatty food liking, fat accumulation and IR increased in CUFA and T. forsythia-infected animals, with the increases in T. forsythia infection and fatty food liking preceding the occurrence of fat accumulation and IR.

Conclusions:

T. forsythia and yellow coating on the dorsal tongue and fatty food liking associate fat accumulation and IR in CUFA. Moreover, we tentatively put forward that T. forsythia, which is very important in yellow tongue-coating microbiota, and its consequent increases in fatty food liking, might be crucial in the development of fat accumulation and IR in CUFA.

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Acknowledgements

We thank all those involved in this work, with particular gratitude to Drs. Li Yuan, Yu-Ming Li, Hui Sun, Feng Gao, Wen-Fang Xia, Hui-Qing Li, Xiu-Ling Deng and Yun-Fei Liao for their generous advice and fruitful discussions. This work was supported by National Natural Science Foundation of China (81471069, 81170737, 81400820 and 81100562).

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Author notes

  1. X Hu and Q Zhang: These authors contributed equally to this work.

Authors and Affiliations

  1. Department of Endocrinology, Union Hospital, Tongji Medical College, Huazhong University of Science and Technology, Wuhan, China

    X Hu, T-S Zeng, J-Y Zhang, J Zheng, W Kong, J Min, S-H Tian & L-L Chen

  2. Department of Cardiovascular Surgery, Union Hospital, Tongji Medical College, Huazhong University of Science and Technology, Wuhan, China

    Q Zhang

  3. Department of Endocrinology, Hubei Provincial Hospital of TCM, Wuhan, China

    M Zhang

  4. State Key Laboratory of Bioactive Substance and Function of Natural Medicines, Beijing Key Laboratory of Drug Target and Screening Research, Institute of Materia Medica of Peking Union Medical College, Beijing, China

    X Yang

  5. Department of Integrated Traditional Chinese and Western Medicine, Union Hospital, Tongji Medical College, Huazhong University of Science and Technology, Wuhan, China

    R Zhu

  6. Department of Stomatology, Union Hospital, Tongji Medical College, Huazhong University of Science and Technology, Wuhan, China

    Z Yuan

  7. Department of Nutrition and Food Science, Texas A&M University, College Station, TX, USA

    C Wu

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  1. X Hu
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Correspondence to X Hu or L-L Chen.

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Cite this article

Hu, X., Zhang, Q., Zhang, M. et al. Tannerella forsythia and coating color on the tongue dorsum, and fatty food liking associate with fat accumulation and insulin resistance in adult catch-up fat. Int J Obes 42, 121–128 (2018). https://doi.org/10.1038/ijo.2017.191

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1038/ijo.2017.191

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