麻豆影院

Audio Script

Common, abundant bacteria may hold key to treating stress disorders
May 16, 2016听听听听听听听听听听听听听听听听听听听听听听听听听听听听听听听听听听听听听听听听听听听听听听听听听听听听听听听听听听听 Christopher Lowry
It lives in dirt and it鈥檚 good for you, so says CU-麻豆影院 researcher Christopher Lowry who is lead author of a study showing that a common and abundant bacteria found in soil can boost the immune system to help fight stress and inflammation.
CUT 1 鈥淐alled mycobacterium vaccae, and this is a very common, abundant bacterium that鈥檚 found in the soil. And the thing to keep in mind is that throughout human evolution humans would have been exposed to large quantities of these types of bacteria. (:15) These types of bacteria have been referred to as 鈥極ld Friends鈥� because humans co-evolved with these bacteria. They are non-pathogenic. And what we鈥檝e learned is that they鈥檙e immunoregulatory. They can actually suppress inappropriate inflammation.鈥� (:29)
Lowry is an associate professor of integrative physiology. For the study researchers injected mice with the bacteria and after a few weeks, mice exposed to the bacteria responded by showing stress resistance and improved coping behaviors.
CUT 2 鈥淲e exposed the mice to a psycho-social stressor where they were co-housed with a larger male that鈥檚 dominant. And mice naturally form dominant-subordinate hierarchies. (:12) And what we found is that when mice were immunized they didn鈥檛 show these submissive behaviors or they showed them at a greatly reduced level. And what we found is that there is a shift toward a more proactive or less reactive, less passive behavioral strategy.鈥� (:29)
Lowry says this summer his research team will hold human clinical trials testing the bacteria on people who have strong inflammatory responses to stress. He says if they respond as the mice did after exposure to the bacteria then it could alter the way we treat people for stress and depression disorders.
CUT 3 鈥淚ndividuals that have a propensity to respond with strong inflammatory responses are at a higher risk for stress related psychiatric disorders. And we can measure this in humans using bio-markers of inflammation. (:17) So the prediction is if you can prevent or suppress those inflammatory responses then you would lower the risk for development of stress related psychiatric disorders.鈥� (:24)
Lowry adds the researchers also found that M. vaccae prevented stress-induced colitis, a typical symptom of inflammatory bowel disease (IBD), suggesting that immunization with the bacteria may have a wide-ranging suite of health benefits.
CUT 4 鈥淭his could be applied very soon in a clinical context because we know that there are very good immunoregulatory agents that can suppress inappropriate inflammation.鈥� (:13) 听
The findings appear today in the journal Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences.
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