Journal Article

Engineering probiotics as living diagnostics and therapeutics for improving human health

Yuan, Qipeng, Sun, Xinxiao, Chen, Xin, Shen, Xiaolin, Sheng, Huakang, Zhou, Zhao, Yan, Yajun, Wang, Jia

2020

Overview

The gut microbiota that inhabit our gastrointestinal tract are well known to play an important role in maintaining human health in many aspects, including facilitating the digestion and absorption of nutrients, protecting against pathogens and regulating immune system. Gut microbiota dysbiosis is associated with a lot of diseases, such as inflammatory bowel disease, allergy, obesity, cardiovascular and neurodegenerative diseases and cancers. With the increasing knowledge of the microbiome, utilization of probiotic bacteria in modulating gut microbiota to prevent and treat a large number of disorders and diseases has gained much interest. In recent years, aided by the continuous development of tools and techniques, engineering probiotic microbes with desired characteristics and functionalities to benefit human health has made significant progress. In this paper, we summarize the recent advances in design and construction of probiotics as living diagnostics and therapeutics for probing and treating a series of diseases including metabolic disorders, inflammation and pathogenic bacteria infections. We also discuss the current challenges and future perspectives in expanding the application of probiotics for disease treatment and detection. We intend to provide insights and ideas for engineering of probiotics to better serve disease therapy and human health.

• Publisher: BioMed Central,BioMed Central Ltd,Springer Nature B.V,BMC
• Subject: Allergies / Allergy / Amino acids / Ammonia / Antibiotics / Applied Microbiology / Bacteria / Biotechnology / Care and treatment / Chemical properties / Chemistry / Chemistry and Materials Science / Chronic diseases / Clinical trials / Clinical Trials as Topic / Complications and side effects / Cytokines / Diabetes / Digestive system / Diseases / Dysbacteriosis / Dysbiosis / Dysbiosis - therapy / Ecosystems / Engineering / Enzymes / Enzymology / Gastrointestinal diseases / Gastrointestinal Microbiome / Gastrointestinal system / Gastrointestinal tract / Genetic Engineering / Health / Health aspects / Homeostasis / Humans / Immune system / Inflammation / Inflammation - diagnosis / Inflammation - therapy / Inflammatory bowel diseases / Inflammatory Bowel Diseases - diagnosis / Inflammatory Bowel Diseases - therapy / Insulin resistance / Intestinal microflora / Intestine / Medical treatment / Metabolic Diseases - diagnosis / Metabolic Diseases - therapy / Metabolic disorders / Metabolic Engineering / Metabolites / Methods / Microbial Genetics and Genomics / Microbiology / Microbiome / Microbiome in human physiological function / Microbiomes / Microbiota / Microbiota (Symbiotic organisms) / Microorganisms / Neoplasms - diagnosis / Neoplasms - therapy / Nervous system diseases / Neurodegenerative diseases / Nutrients / Obesity / Pancreas / Pathogenic microorganisms / Prevention / Probiotics / Probiotics - therapeutic use / Product development / Review / Risk factors / Synthetic Biology / Therapeutics