Flagellin immunization protects mice from detrimental effects of dietary emulsifiers

In a brand new study, mice whose immune systems were trained against the microbial protein flagellin didn’t experience the same old detrimental effects of ingesting food additive emulsifiers, pointing to a possible latest technique to combat various chronic inflammatory diseases. Melissa Kordahi and Benoit Chassaing, Inserm researchers from the Institut Cochin and Université Paris Cité, France, and colleagues present these findings September 19^th within the open access journal PLOS Biology.

Dietary emulsifiers are substances added to processed food products to stop mixed ingredients from separating. Prior research has suggested that eating certain emulsifiers may alter the gut microbiome-;microbes that naturally live within the gut-;in such a way that enhances some microbes’ ability to invade the protective mucosal lining of the gut, and should result in chronic intestinal inflammation. Flagellin, a protein expressed by many bacteria that makes up their whip-like flagellae, enabling them to swim and hence conferring motility, may play a key role in promoting such inflammation.

Constructing on that earlier research, Kordahi and colleagues hypothesized that training the gut’s immune system to focus on flagellin-;immunizing it against flagellin-;may help protect against the detrimental downstream consequences of dietary emulsifiers consumption. To check this concept, they immunized mice to flagellin for several weeks after which fed them food containing two common dietary emulsifiers, carboxymethylcellulose (E466) and polysorbate 80 (E433).

They observed that the immunized mice didn’t experience invasion of microbes into their mucosal lining after ingesting emulsifiers. Furthermore, immunization also appeared to guard against chronic intestinal inflammation and metabolic dysregulations normally observed after emulsifier ingestion.

The researchers also note that, after eating food with emulsifiers, the flagellin-immunized mice still experienced changes within the proportions of varied microbe species that make up their gut microbiomes. This means that the protective effects of flagellin immunization could also be related to its effects on microbe function and movement reasonably than solely an effect on microbiota composition.

More research might be needed to deepen the understanding of the potential use of flagellin immunization and the way well these findings might translate to humans in the long run. Nonetheless, this study suggests that flagellin immunization may very well be a possible latest technique to protect against inflammatory conditions that could be promoted by alterations within the host-microbiota interaction, corresponding to inflammatory bowel disease, obesity, and kind 2 diabetes.

Chassaing adds, “This study suggests that targeted modulation of the intestinal microbiota might be an efficient technique to prevent various chronic inflammatory conditions, corresponding to metabolic deregulations occurring throughout the consumption of commonly used food additives.”