http://www.mdlinx.com/internal-medicine/medical-news-article/2016/04/22/6639469/?news_id=2386&
The Mount Sinai Hospital, 04/22/2016
Specific
combinations of gut bacteria produce substances that affect myelin
content and cause social avoidance behaviors in mice, according to a
study conducted at the Icahn School of Medicine at Mount Sinai and
published in the journal eLife. This research suggests that targeting
intestinal bacteria, or their metabolites, could be one way to treat
debilitating psychiatric disorders and demyelinating diseases, like
multiple sclerosis. This current study led by Patrizia Casaccia, MD,
PhD, Professor of Neuroscience, Genetics and Genomics, and Neurology,
and Chief of the Center of Excellence for Myelin Repair, and
post–doctoral fellow Mar Gacias, PhD, identifies bacteria–derived gut
metabolites that can affect myelin content in the brains of mice and
induce depression–like symptoms. Researchers transferred fecal bacteria
from the gut of depressed mice to genetically distinct mice exhibiting
non–depressed behavior. The study showed that the transfer of microbiota
was sufficient to induce social withdrawal behaviors and change the
expression of myelin genes and myelin content in the brains of the
recipient mice. In an effort to define the mechanism of gut–brain
communication, researchers identified bacterial communities associated
with increased levels of cresol, a substance that has the ability to
pass the blood–brain barrier. When the precursors of myelin–forming
cells were cultured in a dish and exposed to cresol, they lost their
ability to form myelin, thereby suggesting that a gut–derived metabolite
impacted myelin formation in the brain.
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