What Your Microbiome Has to Do With Blood Vessels

May 22, 2025 • Read Time: 5 minutes

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Hello there, 

Can gut bacteria really influence your blood vessels?

A review published in 2024 in the European Journal of Medical Research explores a fascinating connection: the microbes in your gut may influence the growth of lymph and blood vessels throughout the body. This process, known as angiogenesis and lymphangiogenesis, plays a role in everything from inflammation and wound healing to cancer and heart disease.

Source: Adapted from European Journal of Medical Research (2024). Your gut microbiota interacts with multiple organ systems, helping shape inflammation, angiogenesis, and disease progression across the body.

According to the review, researchers describe the gut microbiota and its metabolites as part of a complex network that helps regulate angiogenesis and lymphangiogenesis. This network influences key biological pathways—like the brain–gut, gut–liver, and gut–heart axes—that shape how various diseases progress or improve over time.

What the Study Found

Here’s what the researchers focused on:

  • Your gut microbes send signals through metabolites—some helpful, some harmful. For example, short-chain fatty acids (SCFAs), produced when gut bacteria break down fiber, can reduce inflammation, strengthen the gut barrier, and may even help slow abnormal blood and lymphatic vessel growth in certain cancers.

    On the other hand, TMAO—a compound produced from red meat and high choline intake—has been linked to inflammation, cardiovascular issues, and abnormal angiogenesis and lymphangiogenesis, promoting excess vessel growth in conditions like heart disease and tumors.

  • Diet is a key player. What you eat affects your gut microbiota, which in turn affects blood vessel activity. Fiber and fermented foods may promote healthy angiogenesis, while high-fat diets may lead to a microbiome imbalance (dysbiosis) and overproduction of harmful metabolites

  • Gut-targeted treatments may shape outcomes. Approaches like fecal microbiota transplants (FMT) and oral probiotics are being explored to regulate gut metabolites like SCFAs and TMAO. These strategies may support immune balance, reduce inflammation, and promote healing—but more research is needed.

Why This Matters

This emerging science suggests your gut bacteria may be quietly shaping your long-term health, well beyond digestion.

It may help explain:

  • Why inflammation, cardiovascular risk, and gut health often go hand in hand

  • How prebiotic and probiotic foods could support healing or disease prevention

  • Why diet changes may influence blood vessel function throughout the body

The takeaway? A healthier gut may be a key to supporting your heart, your immune system, and your future.

Want a practical place to start?

Download our free guide featuring three fermented foods that nourish your gut—and may help support healthy blood vessels, too.

3 Fermented Foods For Your Gut.pdf2.25 MB • PDF File

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Best wishes,
- The Angiogenesis Foundation

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