scholarly journals Kin selection explains the evolution of cooperation in the gut microbiota

2021 ◽  
Vol 118 (6) ◽  
pp. e2016046118 ◽  
Author(s):  
Camille Simonet ◽  
Luke McNally
Keyword(s):  
Gut Microbiota ◽  
Predictive Power ◽  
Inclusive Fitness ◽  
Evolution Of Cooperation ◽  
Community Management ◽  
Human Gut ◽  
Full Diversity ◽  
Gut Microbe ◽  
Disease Understanding ◽  
Key Parameter

Through the secretion of “public goods” molecules, microbes cooperatively exploit their habitat. This is known as a major driver of the functioning of microbial communities, including in human disease. Understanding why microbial species cooperate is therefore crucial to achieve successful microbial community management, such as microbiome manipulation. A leading explanation is that of Hamilton’s inclusive-fitness framework. A cooperator can indirectly transmit its genes by helping the reproduction of an individual carrying similar genes. Therefore, all else being equal, as relatedness among individuals increases, so should cooperation. However, the predictive power of relatedness, particularly in microbes, is surrounded by controversy. Using phylogenetic comparative analyses across the full diversity of the human gut microbiota and six forms of cooperation, we find that relatedness is predictive of the cooperative gene content evolution in gut-microbe genomes. Hence, relatedness is predictive of cooperation over broad microbial taxonomic levels that encompass variation in other life-history and ecology details. This supports the generality of Hamilton’s central insights and the relevance of relatedness as a key parameter of interest to advance microbial predictive and engineering science.

scholarly journals Gut Microbiota Metabolism and Interaction with Food Components

2020 ◽  
Vol 21 (10) ◽  
pp. 3688 ◽  
Author(s):  
Pamela Vernocchi ◽  
Federica Del Chierico ◽  
Lorenza Putignani
Keyword(s):  
Gut Microbiota ◽  
Disease Onset ◽  
Human Gut ◽  
Food Components ◽  
Host Health ◽  
Wide Variability ◽  
Gut Microbe ◽  
A Cell ◽  
Health And Disease ◽  
Biochemical Mechanisms

The human gut contains trillions of microbes that play a central role in host biology, including the provision of key nutrients from the diet. Food is a major source of precursors for metabolite production; in fact, diet modulates the gut microbiota (GM) as the nutrients, derived from dietary intake, reach the GM, affecting both the ecosystem and microbial metabolic profile. GM metabolic ability has an impact on human nutritional status from childhood. However, there is a wide variability of dietary patterns that exist among individuals. The study of interactions with the host via GM metabolic pathways is an interesting field of research in medicine, as microbiota members produce myriads of molecules with many bioactive properties. Indeed, much evidence has demonstrated the importance of metabolites produced by the bacterial metabolism from foods at the gut level that dynamically participate in various biochemical mechanisms of a cell as a reaction to environmental stimuli. Hence, the GM modulate homeostasis at the gut level, and the alteration in their composition can concur in disease onset or progression, including immunological, inflammatory, and metabolic disorders, as well as cancer. Understanding the gut microbe–nutrient interactions will increase our knowledge of how diet affects host health and disease, thus enabling personalized therapeutics and nutrition.

scholarly journals Ascertaining the biochemical function of an essential pectin methylesterase in the gut microbe Bacteroides thetaiotaomicron

2020 ◽  
Vol 295 (52) ◽  
pp. 18625-18637
Author(s):  
Cheng-Jie Duan ◽  
Arnaud Baslé ◽  
Marcelo Visona Liberato ◽  
Joseph Gray ◽  
Sergey A. Nepogodiev ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Gut Microbiota ◽  
Critical Role ◽  
Pectin Methylesterase ◽  
Bacteroides Thetaiotaomicron ◽  
Human Gut ◽  
Human Gut Microbiota ◽  
New Family ◽  
Gut Microbe ◽  
Dietary Nutrient ◽  
Helical Proteins

Pectins are a major dietary nutrient source for the human gut microbiota. The prominent gut microbe Bacteroides thetaiotaomicron was recently shown to encode the founding member (BT1017) of a new family of pectin methylesterases essential for the metabolism of the complex pectin rhamnogalacturonan-II (RG-II). However, biochemical and structural knowledge of this family is lacking. Here, we showed that BT1017 is critical for the metabolism of an RG-II–derived oligosaccharide ΔBT1017oligoB generated by a BT1017 deletion mutant (ΔBT1017) during growth on carbohydrate extract from apple juice. Structural analyses of ΔBT1017oligoB using a combination of enzymatic, mass spectrometric, and NMR approaches revealed that it is a bimethylated nonaoligosaccharide (GlcA-β1,4-(2-O-Me-Xyl-α1,3)-Fuc-α1,4-(GalA-β1,3)-Rha-α1,3-Api-β1,2-(Araf-α1,3)-(GalA-α1,4)-GalA) containing components of the RG-II backbone and its side chains. We showed that the catalytic module of BT1017 adopts an α/β-hydrolase fold, consisting of a central twisted 10-stranded β-sheet sandwiched by several α-helices. This constitutes a new fold for pectin methylesterases, which are predominantly right-handed β-helical proteins. Bioinformatic analyses revealed that the family is dominated by sequences from prominent genera of the human gut microbiota, including Bacteroides and Prevotella. Our re-sults not only highlight the critical role played by this family of enzymes in pectin metabolism but also provide new insights into the molecular basis of the adaptation of B. thetaiotaomicron to the human gut.

scholarly journals Glycolate is a Novel Marker of Vitamin B2 Deficiency Involved in Gut Microbe Metabolism in Mice

Nutrients ◽  
2020 ◽  
Vol 12 (3) ◽  
pp. 736 ◽  
Author(s):  
Takashi Uebanso ◽  
Ayumi Yoshimoto ◽  
Shinta Aizawa ◽  
Maya Nakamura ◽  
Rumiko Masuda ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Gut Microbiota ◽  
Bioactive Compounds ◽  
Comprehensive Analysis ◽  
Vitamin B2 ◽  
Human Gut ◽  
Short Term ◽  
Vitamin Deficiencies ◽  
Gut Microbe

Microbes in the human gut play a role in the production of bioactive compounds, including some vitamins. Although several studies attempted to identify definitive markers for certain vitamin deficiencies, the role of gut microbiota in these deficiencies is unclear. To investigate the role of gut microbiota in deficiencies of four vitamins, B2, B6, folate, and B12, we conducted a comprehensive analysis of metabolites in mice treated and untreated with antibiotics. We identified glycolate (GA) as a novel marker of vitamin B2 (VB2) deficiency, and show that gut microbiota sense dietary VB2 deficiency and accumulate GA in response. The plasma GA concentration responded to reduced VB2 supply from both the gut microbiota and the diet. These results suggest that GA is a novel marker that can be used to assess whether or not the net supply of VB2 from dietary sources and gut microbiota is sufficient. We also found that gut microbiota can provide short-term compensation for host VB2 deficiency when dietary VB2 is withheld.

In vitro study of the interaction between human gut microbiota and herbal extracts using willow bark extract as an example

Planta Medica ◽  
2016 ◽  
Vol 81 (S 01) ◽  
pp. S1-S381
Author(s):  
EM Pferschy-Wenzig ◽  
K Koskinen ◽  
C Moissl-Eichinger ◽  
R Bauer
Keyword(s):  
Gut Microbiota ◽  
In Vitro Study ◽  
Vitro Study ◽  
Bark Extract ◽  
Herbal Extracts ◽  
Human Gut ◽  
Human Gut Microbiota ◽  
Willow Bark

Metabolization of the herbal combination STW-5 by human gut microbiota in vitro

2017 ◽  
Author(s):  
EM Pferschy-Wenzig ◽  
A Roßmann ◽  
K Koskinen ◽  
H Abdel-Aziz ◽  
C Moissl-Eichinger ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Gut Microbiota ◽  
Human Gut ◽  
Human Gut Microbiota

Substrate use prioritization by a coculture of five species of gut bacteria fed mixtures of arabinoxylan, xyloglucan, β-glucan, and pectin

2020 ◽  
Author(s):  
Y Liu ◽  
AL Heath ◽  
B Galland ◽  
N Rehrer ◽  
L Drummond ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Gut Microbiota ◽  
Dietary Fiber ◽  
Plant Cell Wall ◽  
Bacterial Species ◽  
Short Chain ◽  
Emergent Properties ◽  
Human Gut ◽  
Fermentation Products ◽  
Plant Polysaccharides ◽  
Human Gut Microbiota

© 2020 American Society for Microbiology. Dietary fiber provides growth substrates for bacterial species that belong to the colonic microbiota of humans. The microbiota degrades and ferments substrates, producing characteristic short-chain fatty acid profiles. Dietary fiber contains plant cell wall-associated polysaccharides (hemicelluloses and pectins) that are chemically diverse in composition and structure. Thus, depending on plant sources, dietary fiber daily presents the microbiota with mixtures of plant polysaccharides of various types and complexity. We studied the extent and preferential order in which mixtures of plant polysaccharides (arabinoxylan, xyloglucan, β-glucan, and pectin) were utilized by a coculture of five bacterial species (Bacteroides ovatus, Bifidobacterium longum subspecies longum, Megasphaera elsdenii, Ruminococcus gnavus, and Veillonella parvula). These species are members of the human gut microbiota and have the biochemical capacity, collectively, to degrade and ferment the polysaccharides and produce short-chain fatty acids (SCFAs). B. ovatus utilized glycans in the order β-glucan, pectin, xyloglucan, and arabinoxylan, whereas B. longum subsp. longum utilization was in the order arabinoxylan, arabinan, pectin, and β-glucan. Propionate, as a proportion of total SCFAs, was augmented when polysaccharide mixtures contained galactan, resulting in greater succinate production by B. ovatus and conversion of succinate to propionate by V. parvula. Overall, we derived a synthetic ecological community that carries out SCFA production by the common pathways used by bacterial species for this purpose. Systems like this might be used to predict changes to the emergent properties of the gut ecosystem when diet is altered, with the aim of beneficially affecting human physiology. This study addresses the question as to how bacterial species, characteristic of the human gut microbiota, collectively utilize mixtures of plant polysaccharides such as are found in dietary fiber. Five bacterial species with the capacity to degrade polymers and/or produce acidic fermentation products detectable in human feces were used in the experiments. The bacteria showed preferential use of certain polysaccharides over others for growth, and this influenced their fermentation output qualitatively. These kinds of studies are essential in developing concepts of how the gut microbial community shares habitat resources, directly and indirectly, when presented with mixtures of polysaccharides that are found in human diets. The concepts are required in planning dietary interventions that might correct imbalances in the functioning of the human microbiota so as to support measures to reduce metabolic conditions such as obesity.

Sign in / Sign up

Export Citation Format

Share Document