Berberine has been used by many different cultures for medicinal purposes, most commonly to treat diarrhoea but it is also employed, particularly in traditional Chinese medicine, as a remedy for diabetes.
Professor David James, head of the diabetes and obesity research programme at the Garvan Institute, Sydney, Australia, said: "We are interested in type 2 diabetes, which is caused by a malfunctioning of insulin action, causing blood sugar regulation to go haywire.
"We have now obtained scientific evidence that shows berberine helps insulin to work much better.
"It helps insulin to control blood sugar. But it also helps to clear fats out of the bloodstream, and we think that this leads to one of its other major end points, which is reduction of body weight."
