Abstract
The global prevalence of metabolic diseases such as obesity, diabetes, and cardiovascular diseases is closely related to overnutrition and imbalanced dietary patterns. As an important carbohydrate, starch directly affects the homeostasis of glucose and lipid metabolism due to its digestion characteristics. Resistant starch (RS) with unique anti-digestive properties and prebiotic functions has become the current hotspot in dietary nutrition research for improving glucose and lipid metabolism disorders. This review summarizes the digestive characteristics of starch and the comprehensive effects of RS and its mechanisms for ameliorating metabolic diseases. Diets with high RS content not only optimize glucose homeostasis by delaying glucose release, the undigested fractions entering the colon also drive the metabolic regulatory network of the gut microbiota-gut-brain axis by activating the AMPK/ACC pathway to reduce fat accumulation, enhancing intestinal barrier function mediated by short-chain fatty acids (SCFAs), and promoting GLP-1/PYY neural signal transduction. These insights facilitate the design of new healthy foods and inspire new strategies for optimizing dietary nutrition and regulating glucose and lipid metabolism disorders caused by high-carbohydrate diets.