More Data on the Effects of Aging on the Gut Microbiome

The gut microbiome changes with age, a shifting of microbial populations that increases chronic inflammation and reduces the production of beneficial metabolites. These changes may be largely due to the age-related decline of the immune system, responsible for removing unwanted microbes, but significant changes occur early enough in life, in the mid-30s, for there to be other factors involved. Researchers are actively engaged in mapping the differences between an old microbiome and a young microbiome, work that will likely lend support to various approaches to therapy intended to rejuvenate the gut microbiome, forcing its balance of microbes towards a more youthful configuration. Probiotics are an obvious strategy, but much more data is needed to validate the specifics of such an approach, and it is far from clear that presently available probiotics, even in large amounts, are useful enough to justify a strong focus on their use, versus, say, approaches such as flagellin immunization or fecal microbiota transplantation. Aging is now the most profound risk factor for almost all non-communicable diseases. Studies have shown that probiotics play a specific role in fighting aging. We used metagenomic sequencing to study the changes in gut microbes in different age groups and found that aging had the most significant effect on subjects' gut microbe structure. Our study divided the subjects (n = 614) into two groups by using 50 years as the age cut-off point for the...
Source: Fight Aging! - Category: Research Authors: Tags: Daily News Source Type: blogs