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Current Atherosclerosis Reports
Published in: Current Atherosclerosis Reports 6/2021

01-06-2021 | Biomarkers | Nutrition (K. Petersen, Section Editor)

Metabolomic Biomarkers of Healthy Dietary Patterns and Cardiovascular Outcomes

Authors: Hyunju Kim, Casey M. Rebholz

Published in: Current Atherosclerosis Reports | Issue 6/2021

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Abstract

Purpose of Review

Healthy dietary patterns are recommended for prevention of CVD. Recently, metabolomics has been used to identify biomarkers of healthy dietary patterns and elucidate mechanisms underlying diet-disease associations. This review provides an overview of approaches to define healthy dietary patterns, discusses important issues related to using metabolomics to describe healthy dietary patterns, and summarizes studies identifying blood metabolites associated with hypothesis-driven healthy dietary patterns and cardiovascular risk factors and incident CVD.

Recent findings

We identified 17 studies which reported on blood metabolomic signatures of 5 healthy dietary patterns (Healthy Eating Index, Alternative Healthy Eating Index, the Dietary Approaches to Stop Hypertension diet, Mediterranean diet, vegetarian diet). Four of these studies evaluated associations between diet-related metabolites and cardiovascular outcomes. Many metabolites replicated across different healthy dietary patterns, which suggest that they may represent biomarkers of generally healthy diets. Unsaturated lipids positively associated with healthy dietary patterns were inversely associated with incident CVD, suggesting that they may be a pathway through which diet is associated with a lower risk of CVD.

Summary

Although many metabolites replicated across cross-sectional studies, few metabolites identified as candidate biomarkers of healthy diets in feeding studies replicated in observational studies. Additionally, limited evidence exists on the ability of diet-related metabolites to predict cardiovascular outcomes. Replication of candidate biomarkers of dietary patterns in different study designs and more studies evaluating the associations between diet-related metabolites and cardiovascular outcomes are needed.
Appendix
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Metadata
Title
Metabolomic Biomarkers of Healthy Dietary Patterns and Cardiovascular Outcomes
Authors
Hyunju Kim
Casey M. Rebholz
Publication date
01-06-2021
Publisher
Springer US
Keyword
Biomarkers
Published in
Current Atherosclerosis Reports / Issue 6/2021
Print ISSN: 1523-3804
Electronic ISSN: 1534-6242
DOI
https://doi.org/10.1007/s11883-021-00921-8

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