Food As Health: From Seed to Microbiome

The Microbiome Shapes Almost Every Aspect of Our Health

Inside each of us is an incredible and unique universe of microorganisms. Numbering in the tens of trillions, these microbes—known as the microbiome or "our invisible organ"—play a vital role in metabolism, immunity, and other health functions.

Despite being associated with disease and bad hygiene, bacteria may actually be key to treating some of our greatest health challenges. Developing therapies that modify the microbiome as well as diets that support the growth of beneficial microbes in our guts is an exciting new frontier of medicine.

Below we share cutting edge research on malnutrition, food allergies, and cancer.

Malnutrition

Microbiome-based therapies can transform the lives of children suffering from severe acute malnutrition, which leads to 3.1 million deaths globally each year. Critically, one third of malnourished children do not respond to the standard therapy of energy-dense food pastes because they lack the gut bacteria needed to absorb nutrients.

OpenBiome is taking an innovative approach by partnering with academic and clinical centers to create a microbiome-based treatment. This new therapeutic will restore critical gut microbes and help children maximize the nutrition available to them.

Explore the connections between the microbiome and malnutrition by reading the studies below.

An 18-month boy has his mid-upper arm circumference measured, as part of a screening program in Kenya identifying children with Severe Acute Malnutrition. Photo Credit: Russel Watkins/DFID. Reprinted under Creative Commons License

This study, published in the New England Journal of Medicine, showed that a diet designed to support microbiome health led to better patient outcomes than the standard treatment of energy-dense foods known as RUSF

The microbiome-directed diet—comprising chickpea flower, soy flower, peanut flour, and banana—had lower caloric density than RUSF but resulted in greater increases in biomarkers of bone growth and neurodevelopment as well as decreases in inflammation.

This research is a critical step forward in understanding what a healthy gut microbiome looks like in children and how specially designed diets can repair damage to the microbiome.

This study is the first randomized clinical trial testing the use of probiotics to treat severe acute malnutrition in young infants.

Results showed that probiotics were more effective than a placebo in helping malnourished children gain weight. Critically, the study identified a specific bacteria strain, B. infantis EVC001, as a promising candidate for designing microbiome-based therapies targeting malnutrition.

"As a non-profit leading the way in translating microbiome research into patient care, we believe that enhancing childhood malnutrition outcomes could be one of our field's most significant impacts. With the potential to save thousands of lives annually, we feel an urgent responsibility to apply this science and rigorously evaluate the effectiveness of microbiome-directed interventions."

- Dr. Majdi Osman, Chief Medical Officer at OpenBiome

Food Allergies

Over the past decade, cases of severe allergies to food, most commonly peanuts, have nearly quadrupled. Scientists believe that food allergies may be related to faulty communication between gut bacteria and the immune system. Read more below to learn how clinicians are using fecal microbiota transplantation (FMT) to alleviate harmful immune reactions.

OpenBiome partnered with Dr. Rima Rachid, an attending physician at Boston Children's Hospital, to run the first clinical trial that treats food allergies by modifying the microbiome.

After receiving a fecal transplant, highly allergic patients were able to consume two peanuts without reacting—a level of tolerance that would protect them from cross contamination at restaurants. The success of this initial study has launched a phase 2 clinical trial.

Cancer

Microbiome-based approaches are the next frontier of cancer treatment. Cutting-edge research suggests that microbes can influence how vulnerable a person is to certain cancers, their response to treatment, and treatment-associated toxicity. Dive deeper into this emerging field of medicine below.

Gina Mendolia filling OpenBiome FMT capsules_Opacity60

This clinical trial is one of the first to test the impact of fecal microbiota transplantation (FMT) on cancer immunotherapy.

Out of 17 patients who had failed immunotherapy, six had a response when the same therapy was re-administered alongside an FMT prepared from immunotherapy-responding stool donors.

These results serve as a foundation for future studies to determine what microbes are necessary for augmenting immunotherapy and to predict which patients will respond.

Immunotherapy is a life-saving drug but can have harsh side effects. Up to 40% of patients experience colitis or inflammation of the colon. If the colitis becomes too severe, patients must stop taking immunotherapy until their inflammation subsides.

This study from MD Anderson Cancer Center, is the first to show that fecal microbiota transplantation (FMT) can resolve colitis and allow cancer patients to resume much needed immunotherapy.

About OpenBiome

OpenBiome is a pioneering nonprofit microbiome health organization. We address systemic inequities in microbiome science to scale our impact on global health.

Learn More

We are solving critical gaps in microbiome science by sharing microbes, data, therapies, and know-how

Our impact: OpenBiome has advanced medical care and science worldwide

OpenBiome's FMT access program has provided 68,000+ investigational treatments to patients in need

Our flagship program, the Global Microbiome Conservancy, radically expands understanding of the microbiome and human health

Explore our microbiome collection—the most globally representative and accessible collection of its kind

Continue the Conversation

Please reach out with questions about the microbiome. We'd love to talk more about the amazing universe of bacteria within us and the future of human health.

Julie Barrett O'Brien

Chief Executive Officer

jobrien@openbiome.org

(617) 834-9227