Abstract
Obesity is associated with cognitive deficit and liver alterations; however, it remains unclear whether a combination of functional foods could reverse cognitive damage and to what extent it would be associated with changes in gut microbiota and liver. With this aim, male Wistar rats were fed a high-fat-5%sucrose diet (HFS) for 4 mo. And were then fed for 1 mo. with bioactive foods. At the end of this period, liver, serum, feces, intestine, and brain samples were taken. Body composition, energy expenditure, LPS, hormones, intraperitoneal glucose tolerance test, behavioral tests, and gut microbiota were evaluated. We showed that male rats fed high-fat-sucrose diet developed gut microbiota dysbiosis, increased in body fat, decreased antioxidant activity, decreased brain neuropeptide Y, increased the number of astrocytes and activated microglia, along with reduced spine density associated with deficits in working memory. Ingestion of a combination of nopal, soy protein, curcumin, and chia seed oil (bioactive foods) for three months was associated with an increase in a cluster of bacteria with anti-inflammatory capacity, a decrease in serum LPS levels and an increase in serum eicosapentaenoic acid (EPA) with neuroprotective properties. In the liver, ingestion of bioactive food significantly increased antioxidant enzymes, decreased lipogenesis, reduced inflammation mediated by the TLR4-TNFα pathway along with a decrease in body fat, glucose intolerance, and metabolic inflexibility. Finally, neuroinflammation in the brain was reduced and working memory improved. Our study demonstrates that consumption of bioactive foods was associated with reduced liver, brain, and gut microbiota alterations in obese rats.
Highlights
Studies in individuals and animals have demonstrated that consumption of a high fat and sugar diet causes inflammation which spread into the brain, affecting key components of cognition [1]
The study consisted in two phases: (1) Obesity-induction: during the first 4 months, rats were randomized into two groups; (i) control rats (C, n = 8) fed a control diet prepared according to the American Institute of Nutrition recommendations (AIN-93) [4], and (ii) a high fat-sucrose diet (HFS) consisting of a high fat diet and 5% sucrose added to the drinking water (HFS, n = 32)
This weight gain was reversed with addition of bioactive foods by 23% with respect to high-fat-5%sucrose diet (HFS) group; this reduction was faster than the group HFS → C diet (21.2%), the combination of C diet with bioactive foods resulted in a 32.8% of decreased in body weight (Figure 1B)
Summary
Studies in individuals and animals have demonstrated that consumption of a high fat and sugar diet causes inflammation which spread into the brain, affecting key components of cognition [1]. Several factors have been involved in the development of cognitive dysfunction, including dysbiosis in the gut microbiota [2], increase in oxidative stress in the central nervous system [3], and possibly other metabolic abnormalities in other organs of the body, in the liver. In obesity, which is often associated with consumption of a high fat and sugar diet, an imbalance in the gut microbiota was found to be associated with impaired gut barrier function and translocation of lipopolysaccharide (LPS) and inflammation in various tissues, such as liver, adipose, and brain tissue [4,5,6]. We investigated whether consumption of an HFS diet produces dysbiosis of the gut microbiota, alters body composition and proinflammatory markers, decreases hepatic antioxidant enzymes, and impairs glucose and energy metabolism, brain structure, and cognitive function. We examined whether ingestion of bioactive foods (BF) can reverse these disturbances
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