Probiotics boosting immunity in early life
Maldevelopment of the immune system in early life, characterized by impaired immune-microbiota interaction, increases the risk of children’s health issues and in later life chronic immune-related diseases. Probiotics hold great promise in restoring the impairment of immune-microbiota interaction by producing beneficial functions that guide immune cell development. Here, we will screen and identify which gut-adapted bacterial strains potently induce immune cell differentiation and decipher the underlying mechanisms of action using ex vivo assays and in vitro anaerobic gut-on-a-chip system. This is an international collaboration of the University of Amsterdam with SURI Biotech GmbH.
The prevalence of immune disorders, such as asthma, has doubled in Western Europe over the last two decades. Antibiotic interventions and C-section delivery are known risk factors for childhood asthma. Observational and experimental studies link the development of asthma to the dysbiosis of the gut microbiota induced by those interventions. Specific gut microbes have protective roles against immune disorders. For example, Bifidobacterium species in the infant gut have been linked to protection against asthma and atopic dermatitis. Probiotics containing infant gut-adapted bacteria can be used to restore microbes that influence immune programming.
This project will apply the screening-validation-mechanism approach. Firstly, we will use ex vivo screening assay to discover the probiotic candidates that can effectively induce beneficial immune responses. Second, we will validate the effects using a state-of-the-art anaerobic gut-on-a-chip system and, finally, use multi-omics to identify key bacterial factors mediating the effects and pathways that respond to the probiotic intervention.
The proposed research may identify promising new probiotic strains programming immune cells, paving the way for new strategies in the nutritional prevention of immune disorders in early life.
