Glucosamine regulates macrophage function in heart failure

Association Between Glucosamine Use and the Risk of Incident Heart Failure: The UK Biobank Cohort Study and Mendelian Randomization Analysis

OBJECTIVE

To evaluate the association between regular glucosamine intake and heart failure (HF) and to explore whether the association is mediated by relevant cardiovascular disease.

PATIENTS AND METHODS

We included 479,650 participants with data available for supplement use and without HF at baseline from the UK Biobank study. Using 12 single-nucleotide polymorphisms linked to HF, a weighted genetic risk score was calculated. We evaluated the association between glucosamine use and HF by Cox regression models after inverse probability of treatment weighting. A validation and mediation analysis were performed through two-sample Mendelian randomization. The study was from May 18, 2006, to February 16, 2018.

RESULTS

During a median follow-up of 9.0 (IQR, 8.3-9.8) years, we documented 5501 incident cases of HF. In multivariable analysis, the HR of glucosamine users for HF was 0.87 (95% CI, 0.81 to 0.94). The inverse associations were stronger in males and participants with unfavorable lifestyle (P<.05 for interaction). Genetic risk categories did not modify this association (P>.05 for interaction). Multivariable Mendelian randomization showed that taking glucosamine was protective against HF (HR, 0.92; 95% CI, 0.87 to 0.96). The mediated proportion of coronary heart disease and stroke were 10.5% (95% CI, 7.6% to 13.4%) and 14.4% (95% CI, 10.8% to 18.0%), respectively. The two-mediator combination accounted for 22.7% (95% CI, 17.2% to 28.2%) of the effect of glucosamine use.

CONCLUSION

Regular glucosamine supplementation was associated with a lower risk of HF regardless of genetic risk status, and to a lesser extent, coronary heart disease and stroke mediated this effect. The results may inform novel pathway for prevention and intervention toward HF.

An update on the review of microbial synthesis of glucosamine and N-acetylglucosamine

Glucosamine (GlcN) is a natural amino monosaccharide in which a hydroxyl group of glucose is substituted by an amino group. It belongs to functional amino sugar compounds. In the traditional preparation process, GlcN and GlcNAc are obtained by hydrolyzing the cell wall of shrimp and crab. There are many potential problems with this method, such as geographical and seasonal restrictions on the supply of raw materials, serious environmental pollution and potential allergic reactions. Microbial fermentation has the advantages of mild conditions, low environmental pollution, high production intensity, and product safety. It can effectively solve the problem of shrimp and crab hydrolysis process, attracting many researchers to participate in the research of microbial fermentation production of GlcN. This paper mainly summarizes the research on strain construction method, metabolic pathway design and fermentation condition optimization in microbial fermentation, which has certain guiding significance for the further production, research and production of glucosamine.