Understanding Acupuncture Based on ZHENG Classification from System Perspective

Figure 2

Special effect of meridian and acupoint. A plasma metabolomics investigation was designed to investigate the metabolic difference between FD patients and healthy volunteers, and a series of differential metabolites were sought out (b). The pathway analysis indicated that FD is related to some disorders in energy metabolism and especially to the NEI dysfunction (c) and the corresponding ZHENGs of FD are mainly regarded as Pi-Wei weakness or Gan depression and Pi deficiency (d). When the Wei and its Back-Shu and Front-Mu points as well as the specific acupoints of Yang-mingjing were needled, both of them have beneficial regulative effects on the metabolites associated with FD (a). The corresponding changes of NEI network reflect that different points selection methods may have certain regulative effects on different TCM ZHENGs, which might be the mechanism of Meridian Specificity.