Irish-designed probiotics may help control conditions such as obesity

IRISH scientists have designed probiotics that can be used to modulate the physiology of host fat cells, a finding which could prove useful in controlling conditions such as obesity.

The scientists from the Alimentary Pharmabiotic Centre (APC) in Cork, University College Cork and Teagasc, have engineered a strain of Lactobacillus to produce a version of a molecule called conjugated linoleic acid (CLA).

When this engineered bacterial strain was fed to mice, the researchers found that the composition of the mice’s fat tissue was significantly altered, demonstrating that ingesting live bacteria can influence metabolism at remote sites in the body.

Teagasc’s Dr Catherine Stanton, who led the study, said: “CLA has already been shown to alleviate non-alcoholic fatty liver disease that often accompanies obesity.

Therefore, increasing levels of CLA in the liver by ingestion of a probiotic strain is of therapeutic relevance.

“Furthermore, fat is not an inert layer around our bodies, it is active and proinflammatory and is a risk factor for many diseases, including cancers. The work shows that there is potential to influence this through diet-microbe-host interactions in the gut.”

The same group of researchers previously found that microbially produced CLA was able to reduce the viability of colon cancer cells by 92%.

Dr Stanton said: “It is possible that a CLA-producing probiotic may also be able to keep colon cancer cells in check.

“All our findings to date demonstrate that the metabolism of gut bacteria can modulate host cell activity in ways that are beneficial to the host.

“We need to further investigate the effects of CLA-producing bacteria on human metabolism, but our work so far certainly opens up new possibilities for the use of probiotics for improvement of human health.”