Seeking an Obesity Cure, Researchers Turn to the Gut Microbiome
Dr. Elaine Yu, an endocrinologist at Massachusetts General Hospital in Boston, was inundated with volunteers when she put out a call a few years ago for overweight people who were willing to take part in a study of obesity and the microbiome.
People as far away as Alaska and Hawaii were eager to enroll. But the most surprising part was what they were willing to do. required them to swallow capsules containing stool to test whether gut bacteria from lean donors could improve their metabolic health.
“We had this concern that it would be difficult to recruit people because there’s a certain yuck factor with having to take a poop pill,” Dr. Yu said. “But we had an overwhelming number of volunteers wanting to participate.”
The link between the gut and metabolic disease is a growing area of obesity research. In recent years, scientists have uncovered clues that the microbiota, the community of trillions of microbes that live in the gut. Now, in small studies, they are exploring whether they can spur changes in metabolism and potentially in body weight through a therapy known as fecal microbiota transplants, or F.M.T., which transfers gut bacteria from lean donors to the guts of obese patients.
The research, which is still in its infancy, has yielded mixed results and plenty of skepticism. Experts say fecal transplants will never replace diet, exercise, behavioral therapies and other standard interventions for obesity and Type 2 diabetes. But some believe they could lead to the discovery of bacteria that protect against metabolic disease, and perhaps become one of many tools that help obese patients who are struggling to shed pounds.
“Obesity is a very complex disorder,” said Dr. Jessica Allegretti, the director of the Fecal Microbiota Transplant Program at Brigham and Women’s Hospital. “Perhaps the microbiome is a contributing part of it, and maybe for everyone it’s slightly different. But even for patients where the microbiome is playing a big part, I think this would be something that is part of a larger weight loss program.”
- Filed in :
- Microbiome