6-Gingerol is the major pungent component in ginger. It possesses a variety of health benefits including antitumor, anti-inflammatory and antioxidant, hypoglycemic, hypolipidemic and hypotensive activities as well as colitis prevention and treatment. However, the health effects of oral 6-gingerol are limited due to the low water solubility, poor gastrointestinal stability, rapid metabolism in the body, release at non-target sites, and pungent and bitter taste. In this article, the health effects of 6-gingerol including anticancer, anti-inflammatory and hypolipidemic activity, and preventing and treating cardiovascular and cerebrovascular diseases as well as gastrointestinal diseases are reviewed together with the underlying mechanisms. Based on a review of recent progress in the research on the gastrointestinal absorption of 6-gingerol, its distribution, metabolism and excretion in the systematic circulation and its metabolic processes in the upper and lower gastrointestinal tract, the current status of the design and development of oral delivery systems for 6-gingerol. The mechanism for the enhancing effect of delivery systems on the health benefits of 6-gingerol and the design principle of the strategies to enhance the health benefits of 6-gingerol are elucidated. Hopefully, this review will not only provide a theoretical guidance for the design of oral delivery systems for 6-gingerol and the research on the mechanism for the enhancing effect of oral delivery systems on the health benefits of 6-gingerol, but also provide scientific evidence for the design of 6-gingerol-based functional foods.

Lipid phase composition of nanostructured lipid carriers (NLCs) modulates their digestive release behavior and cellular uptake by macrophage. In this study, the effects of the percentage of beeswax in the binary lipid mixture on the physical properties, lipid digestion, curcumin release, intestinal adhesion and penetration, and macrophage uptake of NLCs were investigated by in vivo simulated digestion, ex vivo intestinal adhesion and penetration and RAW264.7 mouse macrophage uptake experiments. The results showed that the particle size, loading efficiency and encapsulation efficiency of NLCs increased with an increase in the percentage of beeswax in the lipid phase. Compared with NLCs without beeswax (NLC0), whose oil phase consisted of medium chain fatty acid triglycerides (MCT), addition of 5% or 10% beeswax to MCT significantly improved the apparent viscosity, physical stability, intestinal mucosal adhesion and penetration of NLCs (the fluorescence signal intensity of curcumin in epithelial cells increased by 20.27% and 55.02%, respectively). Additionally, with an increase in beeswax content, the lipolysis efficiency, the release rate of free fatty acid (FFA) and the amount of released curcumin from NLCs decreased significantly; the release rate of FFA decreased in the following order: K_NLC0 (0.13 min^-1) > K_NLC5 (0.08 min^-1) > K_NLC10 (0.06 min^-1), and the amount of released curcumin declined in the following order: R_NLC0 ((99.93 ± 0.09)%) > R_NLC5 ((96.38 ± 0.05)%) > R_NLC10 ((90.05 ± 0.05)%), indicating sustained release characteristics. Compared with free curcumin, NLCs promoted the enrichment of curcumin in RAW264.7 macrophages by 5.68–6.25 times. These findings can provide guidance for the application of beeswax based NLCs in oral delivery of lipophilic active ingredients and regulation of health effects.