Grant: Team Grant: Intestinal Microbiomics

Interactions between diet, gut bacteria and its host are complex. Diet can significantly impact on the type and activity of gut bacteria and in this way play a major role in affecting the health of the host. Indeed, abnormal gut bacteria composition has been associated with an increasing number of human diseases including inflammatory bowel diseases, celiac disease, rheumatoid arthritis, multiple sclerosis, type1 diabetes, obesity and liver disease. Dietary habits have changed dramatically in the last decades and it has been suggested that this negatively impacts gut bacteria and promotes disease. However, a clear mechanism for diet-induced, altered gut bacteria leading to inflammation has not been determined. This is important to accomplish if we wish to prevent disease through a healthy diet. Some inflammatory diseases of the gut involve dysregulation of a receptor, called AhR, that regulates important molecules involved in the immune response. This research proposal is designed to solve this issue by investigating the crosstalk between diet, gut bacteria and host with special emphasis on the AhR receptor and the immune pathways it regulates. For this we will identify new probiotic candidates and diets that modulate the AhR receptor and trigger protective immune responses in mice and humans.