In China in the fourth century there was a strange soup called Yellow soup It was consumed as a treatment in severe cases of food poisoning and diarrhea. This soup was started by Chinese doctor Ji Hong and incorporated stool that helped patients restore their intestinal microorganisms.
Today, yellow soup, or other variants, such as fecal transplantation, is an innovative practice receiving increasing attention in clinical medicine. The reason is that feces are rich in a large amount of microorganisms, which, as was discovered at the beginning of the twentieth century, consist of a whole series of bacteria, yeasts or viruses, the so-called microbiota, which coexist in the intestine and in other organs. The intestinal microbiota – which performs various functions, such as fermenting food, protecting against pathogens, stimulating the immune response or producing vitamins – is acquired at birth and develops, depending on a person's lifestyle, environment and diet.
However, in some cases, the microbiota gets out of balance, and fecal transplants allow a healthy person's intestinal microorganisms to be collected through their stool and transferred to another person's colon. This technique has proven effective in treating many cases of severe diarrhea, because it helped restore this balance that was often lost after treatment with antibiotics or chemotherapy.
This manipulation of intestinal microbial populations has applications not only in humans but also in animals, and could have great potential to improve health in the livestock and aquaculture sector, as it is a strategy that allows enhancing animal welfare and transforming production in a natural and natural way. Sustainable way.
Bream with the intestinal characteristics of salmon
In fact, this is what a group of researchers from the Institute of Agri-Food Research and Technology (IRTA) in Rapita, led by Karl P. Andre, tested on fish. The experiment was recently published in magazine Scientific reportsmade possible the first microbiota transplantation between two different fish species: Atlantic salmon (Hello Salar(Kamaneh and seabream)Sparos aurataFuture com.
In this work, a group of sea bream was treated with a mixture of antibiotics to eliminate gut microbes, and then cultured with salmon microbes. In addition, to evaluate the effect of diet on the maintenance and incorporation of new microbiota after transplantation, one group of sea bream with salmon microbiota was fed their usual diet, while another group received the salmon diet.
It was observed that sea bream that continued their usual diet, despite receiving salmon microbiota, maintained a microbial richness similar to that of pre-transplant sea bream. Conversely, bream fed a salmon diet presented, at the end of the experiment, a microbial richness similar to that of salmon, but different from its original state. This study highlights the effect of diet on long-term maintenance of gut microbiota after fecal transplants, a relevant aspect to consider when modifying gut microbial populations in the future. Food components not only provide essential nutrients but also provide substrates that nourish the gut microbiome. These substrates are metabolized to a wide range of metabolites, which in turn affect the structure, composition and function of the intestine.
Fecal transplantation in the future
This study, part of the ADIPOQUIZ project, was funded by the Ministry of Science, Innovation and Universities, and marked a major advance in understanding the intestinal microbiota of fish used in aquaculture. Furthermore, as observed here and in other animal species or in humans, the relationship between gut microbiota and diet is crucial. Understanding this interaction may open new opportunities to improve digestive health, both in livestock and fisheries and in medicine.
Last year, the first oral fecal probiotic treatment got the green light to prevent recurrence of infections caused by a type of bacteria, Clostridium difficile. This bacterium causes one of the major infectious diarrheal diseases in hospitalized patients, and treatment with fecal microbiota is becoming increasingly popular.
In the future, these and other treatments, combined with diet, could have the potential to reshape animal gut ecosystems and modify microbial communities according to our needs and will.
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