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Published on: July 31, 2019
Multi-herb formulations modulating gut microbiota: A systematic review and data-driven analysis.
Min-Seok Cho1, In-Seon Lee2, Junsuk Kim3
1Department of Clinical Korean Medicine, Graduate School, Kyung Hee University, Seoul, Republic of Korea.
Journal of Ethnopharmacology
|June 19, 2026
Summary
This study maps how multi-herb formulations affect the gut microbiota, identifying specific herbs like Scutellaria baicalensis and Zingiber officinale linked to microbial shifts. These findings offer a foundation for developing standardized ethnopharmacological therapies.
Area of Science:
- Microbiome research
- Pharmacology
- Ethnobotany
Background:
- Multi-herb formulations are complex and widely used in traditional medicine to influence the gut microbiota.
- Identifying reproducible herb-microbiota associations across diverse clinical settings presents a significant challenge.
Purpose of the Study:
- To systematically synthesize human clinical evidence on multi-herb formulation effects on gut microbiota.
- To identify specific herbal components associated with directional microbial shifts.
Main Methods:
- Systematic review and data-driven analysis of 29 clinical trials (954 participants).
- Binarization strategy for statistically significant directional microbial shifts (+1 increase, -1 decrease).
- Extreme Gradient Boosting (XGBoost) with SHapley Additive exPlanations (SHAP) for constituent analysis, validated using Leave-One-Study-Out (LOSO) cross-validation.
Main Results:
- Leave-One-Study-Out (LOSO) validation achieved 0.84 accuracy and 0.42 macro F1-score, showing cross-study pattern recognition despite data heterogeneity.
- Formulations with Scutellaria baicalensis were linked to reduced Escherichia-Shigella in neuropsychiatric contexts.
- Zingiber officinale formulations showed associations with both increases and decreases in specific gut taxa across various conditions.
Conclusions:
- Provides an evidence-based map of multi-herb formulation-induced gut microbiota modulation.
- Identified hypothesis-generating patterns that overcome individual study variations, prioritizing rigorous validation.
- Establishes a foundation for future metagenomic research and standardized ethnopharmacological therapies.
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