Sanz Yolanda, Santacruz Arlette, De Palma Giada
Institute of Agrochemistry and Food Technology (IATA), Spanish National Research Council (CSIC), P.O. Box 73, Burjassot, 46100 Valencia, Spain.
Interdiscip Perspect Infect Dis. 2008;2008:829101. doi: 10.1155/2008/829101. Epub 2008 Dec 3.
Obesity is a major public health issue as it enhances the risk of suffering several chronic diseases of increasing prevalence. Obesity results from an imbalance between energy intake and expenditure, associated with a chronic low-grade inflammation. Gut microbes are considered to contribute to body weight regulation and related disorders by influencing metabolic and immune host functions. The gut microbiota as a whole improves the host's ability to extract and store energy from the diet leading to body weight gain, while specific commensal microbes seem to exert beneficial effects on bile salt, lipoprotein, and cholesterol metabolism. The gut microbiota and some probiotics also regulate immune functions, protecting the host form infections and chronic inflammation. In contrast, dysbiosis and endotoxaemia may be inflammatory factors responsible for developing insulin resistance and body weight gain. In the light of the link between the gut microbiota, metabolism, and immunity, the use of dietary strategies to modulate microbiota composition is likely to be effective in controlling metabolic disorders. Although so far only a few preclinical and clinical trials have demonstrated the effects of specific gut microbes and prebiotics on biological markers of these disorders, the findings indicate that advances in this field could be of value in the struggle against obesity and its associated-metabolic disorders.
肥胖是一个重大的公共卫生问题，因为它会增加患几种患病率不断上升的慢性疾病的风险。肥胖是由能量摄入与消耗之间的失衡导致的，与慢性低度炎症相关。肠道微生物被认为通过影响宿主的代谢和免疫功能来促进体重调节及相关疾病的发生。总体而言，肠道微生物群会提高宿主从饮食中提取和储存能量的能力，从而导致体重增加，而特定的共生微生物似乎对胆盐、脂蛋白和胆固醇代谢具有有益作用。肠道微生物群和一些益生菌还会调节免疫功能，保护宿主免受感染和慢性炎症的侵害。相反，生态失调和内毒素血症可能是导致胰岛素抵抗和体重增加的炎症因素。鉴于肠道微生物群、代谢和免疫之间的联系，采用饮食策略调节微生物群组成可能对控制代谢紊乱有效。尽管到目前为止只有少数临床前和临床试验证明了特定肠道微生物和益生元对这些疾病生物标志物的影响，但研究结果表明，该领域的进展可能对对抗肥胖及其相关代谢紊乱具有重要价值。
