Polyphenols and nutrigenetic/nutrigenomic associations with obesity-related metabolic diseases

Obesity and its related complications are considered global health problems because of their strong impact on health, economy, and quality of life. Nutritional factors have important roles in the etiology of obesity and its complications by interacting with molecular mechanisms that modulate physiological functions in the body. With the development of nutrigenetics and nutrigenomics using high-throughput “omics” technologies, strong evidence has supported the notion that genetic variations involved in obesity and metabolic disturbances interact with environmental factors such as diet, modulating individual susceptibility to developing obesity-related metabolic diseases. Furthermore, studies have shown the important role of dietary polyphenols as promising complementary agents useful in preventing or mitigating obesity and its complications. This chapter highlights the metabolic actions of polyphenols, especially catechins, resveratrol, curcumin, and luteolin, on intracellular molecular mechanisms from a nutritional genetics and genomics perspective, that is, from the viewpoint of these new disciplines centered on the relations among nutrition, biochemistry, molecular biology, and genomics.