Measurement of gut health-mediated resilience: combining gut microbiome measurement and phenotypic flexibility to understand health effects by microbiome modulations via prebiotic fibers

In this public private partnership TNO, DSM Nutritional Products and CHDR investigated in healthy people (age 45+ years) the systemic health effects of modulating the gut microbiome by a nutritional intervention of a prebiotic fiber mix.

Disease prevention through improving human health is attracting more attention. The gut microbiome is an important new target in these approaches. However, even though the role of the microbiome in human health and disease is increasingly recognized, the specific relationships between gut microbiome and human health are largely unknown and there was an urgent need for new approaches to study this interaction, not only in lab mice but also in humans.  

Previously, TNO developed two measurement solutions, one on the gut microbiome which is a platform called i-screen and one on measurement of health in form of resilience in healthy people (quantification of a person’s phenotypic flexibility (personal response to a dietary challenge).

In the No Guts No Glory project we executed a randomized placebo-controlled cross-over clinical trial to investigate the effects of gut microbiome modulation by a dietary fiber mix on health as quantified as a person’s phenotypic flexibility (DOI 10.1016/j.numecd.2024.01.028). While we did not see a significant difference on the phenotypic flexibility measures, we showed that the fiber mix modulated the microbiome composition in vitro (i-screen) similarly as in vivo (clinical study, doi.org/10.3390/proceedings2023091418). In addition, participants showed an improvement of mood in females during the microbiome intervention.