Anti-aging activities and mechanisms of food-medicine homology Chinese herbs in Caenorhabditis elegans models

With the aggravation of social aging, aging and related diseases have become global health issues. According to traditional Chinese medicine theory, dietary therapy is a method of promoting health by adjusting diet and utilizing food. Caenorhabditis elegans has become a classic model for studying aging and related diseases due to its short lifespan, clear genetic background, and highly conserved aging mechanism. This article presents various Caenorhabditis elegans models and systematically reviews the research on the anti-aging effects of food-medicine homology Chinese medicines, traditional Chinese medicines with functional food potential, and dietary supplements that have been evaluated using the C. elegans model. The C. elegans model is an efficient, ethically favorable platform for discovering and mechanistically characterizing anti-aging functional foods from TCM.