Polyphenol-based prebiotics and synbiotics: potential for cancer chemoprevention

The need for new cancer chemoprevention approaches is evident by the continued increase of the social and economic burden due to cancer incidence worldwide. Polyphenols, ubiquitous dietary antioxidants present in plant foods, possess chemopreventive and therapeutic characteristics. However, the chemoprevention potential of oligomeric and polymeric polyphenols is considerably limited due to their low bioavailability, characterized by limited absorption. Colonic microbiota plays an important role in the absorption of these complexly structured polyphenols, by converting them into easily absorbable and simple phenolic compounds. Therefore, the chemopreventive potential of complex polyphenols is greatly dependent on the colonic microbiota of individuals. This review reveals that a synbiotic intervention could be more useful in such cases to alleviate prebiotic and probiotic interdependency and improve the potential in chemoprevention. The chemopreventive potential of many microbial metabolites of polyphenols is well established by in vitro studies. Further investigations are required in this area to evaluate in vivo efficacy of these metabolites in chemoprevention.