Browse evidence-based analysis of health-related claims and assertions
Berberine, a natural compound, seems to lower a harmful protein (PCSK9) in liver cells much more than you’d expect just from slightly reducing two other helper proteins—like turning off a light by dimming two switches just a little, but the room gets super dark anyway.
Mechanistic
In liver cells, two specific DNA switches work together to turn on a gene called PCSK9 — if you break one switch (HNF1), the other one (SRE) can’t do its job properly, even if it’s still intact.
Scientists have made new versions of berberine pills that help the body absorb much more of the drug, making them potentially more effective at lower doses.
Quantitative
Berberine, a natural compound, lowers a protein called PCSK9 in liver cells by gently reducing two other proteins that help make PCSK9 — and when both of those go down together, PCSK9 drops even more than if only one did.
When you take berberine by mouth, very little of it actually gets into your bloodstream because your gut and liver break it down or push it back out before it can work.
Descriptive
In a type of liver cell called HepG2, a protein called HNF1α is the main switch that turns on the PCSK9 gene — when scientists turned off HNF1α, PCSK9 dropped by 85%, but turning off a similar protein, HNF1β, only cut it by 44%.
Berberine, a natural compound, may help lower fat in your blood by turning on a cellular switch that stops your body from making new fat and starts burning existing fat instead—this has been seen in lab tests and animals, but not yet confirmed in humans.
Scientists found that if they break a specific 'on switch' near a gene called PCSK9 in liver cancer cells, the gene barely works anymore—meaning this switch is super important for making the gene active.
Berberine, a natural compound, may help lower bad cholesterol by helping your liver grab more of it from your blood—kind of like turning up a vacuum cleaner that sucks up cholesterol, thanks to how it blocks a protein called PCSK9 and keeps the cholesterol sensors in your liver working longer.
People with diabetes or high triglycerides who take berberine daily for a couple of months often see their blood fat levels drop significantly, especially if their levels were very high to begin with.
Taking berberine pills daily for a few months may help lower your bad cholesterol and overall cholesterol levels if you have high cholesterol, diabetes, or metabolic syndrome.
People who took dihydroberberine pills multiple times had more berberine in their blood before their last pill, which means their bodies built up the compound over time — like filling a glass drop by drop until it’s full.
Even though dihydroberberine gets more berberine into the blood, it didn’t lower blood sugar or insulin after a sugary meal in healthy men.
When you swallow a 500 mg berberine pill, almost none of it actually gets into your bloodstream — your body barely absorbs it, so it’s mostly just passing through.
Taking four 200 mg pills of dihydroberberine a day gives you more berberine in your blood than four 100 mg pills, but not enough to say for sure it’s a real difference—maybe your body can’t absorb more than a certain amount no matter how much you take.
Taking a special form of berberine called dihydroberberine (100 mg four times a day) gets way more of the active compound into your bloodstream than taking regular berberine pills (500 mg), meaning your body absorbs it much better.
For people who’ve never had a heart attack or stroke, lowering 'bad' cholesterol helps less as they get older—but for those who’ve already had a heart problem, lowering cholesterol still works just as well no matter how old they are.
Causal
Lowering 'bad' cholesterol (LDL-C) keeps your heart healthier over the long term, and the more time passes, the same level of protection continues—no weakening.
Lowering your 'bad' cholesterol by just a little bit—about 1 mmol/L—can cut your risk of serious heart problems like heart attacks or strokes by roughly 22%, and this has been seen again and again in big studies with hundreds of thousands of people.
Correlational
Scientists think a compound called THBru might help the body burn fat better by activating a natural 'metabolism switch' called AMPK, and they saw this happen in mouse livers and human liver cells in a dish.
A natural compound called THBru helps liver cells lower bad cholesterol by turning on a specific cellular switch (AMPK), but if you block that switch, THBru can't do its job anymore.
A natural compound called THBru may help lower bad cholesterol by turning down genes that block cholesterol removal and turning up the gene that helps the liver pull cholesterol out of the blood.
A natural compound called THBru might stick directly to a key energy sensor in liver cells, and scientists saw this happen in lab tests using mouse livers and human liver cells in a dish.
Giving a natural compound called THBru to mice that eat a lot of fat helps their livers stay healthier and better manage fats in their blood.