Study: Right gut bacteria may protect against malnutrition
WASHINGTON – Manipulating what kinds of bacteria live in the gut might lead to a new way to treat millions of children suffering chronic malnutrition, says new research that suggests the right microbes can help get the most out of a poor diet.
Researchers culled intestinal bacteria from babies and toddlers in Malawi, where malnutrition is a serious problem, and transferred them into mice for study. Tweaking those gut microbes improved growth – even though the animals didn’t eat more, or more nutritiously.
We share our bodies with trillions of bacteria, a customized set called a microbiome that starts building at birth, and Thursday’s work is the latest to illustrate how crucial it is to develop a healthy one.
“If we could hammer home a key point, microbiota count,” said Dr. Jeffrey Gordon of Washington University in St. Louis, who led the experiments published in Science and Cell. “Building healthy gut microbiota we think is important for health in the course of one’s life.”
Gut bacteria do more than break down food for digestion. They synthesize particular vitamins and micronutrients, and influence immune responses.
“A healthy microbiome will allow us to access calories we might not have been able to use before,” explained Dr. Ilseung Cho, a gastroenterologist and gut bacteria specialist at New York University School of Medicine, who wasn’t involved in the work.
More research is needed, but Cho said the findings suggest there may be “very precise bacteria or very precise nutrient interventions that can unlock the microbiome and help it combat malnutrition.”
While providing special “therapeutic foods” and supplements helps reduce deaths, Gordon said children still experience stunted growth and neurodevelopmental problems. His team turned to Malawi, where according to UNICEF almost half of children under 5 have growth stunted by malnutrition.
Working with more than 250 children, Gordon’s team defined how a healthy gut microbiome develops – and found the chronically malnourished tots harbored an immature one, too young for their age.
Are those abnormal gut bacteria a result of malnutrition, or could they be contributing to it? To tell, the researchers transferred gut bacteria from healthy or malnourished tots into different sets of baby mice.
Despite eating the same calories, mice with the healthy gut bacteria gained more lean body mass, and showed healthier bone development and better metabolism, the team reported.
The team also reported breast milk from the mothers of healthy Malawian babies harbors higher levels of sugars containing sialic acid, a nutrient linked to brain development.