Oral Supplements of Combined Bacillus licheniformis Zhengchangsheng® and Xylooligosaccharides Improve High-Fat Diet-Induced Obesity and Modulate the Gut Microbiota in Rats.

Yuyuan Li,Man Liu,Ming Li,Xianying Su,Jieli Yuan,He Liu,Xiaoqing Wei

doi:10.1155/2020/9067821

Abstract

Gut dysbiosis induced by high-fat diet (HFD) may result in low-grade inflammation leading to diverse inflammatory diseases. The beneficial effects of probiotics and prebiotics on obesity have been reported previously. However, their benefits in promoting human health and the underlying mechanisms still need to be further characterized. This study is aimed at understanding how probiotic Bacillus licheniformis Zhengchangsheng® (BL) and prebiotic xylooligosaccharides (XOS) influence the health of a rat model with HF (60 kcal %) diet-induced obesity. Five groups of male Sprague Dawley (SD) rats were fed a normal fat diet (CON) or an HFD with or without BL and XOS supplementation for 3 weeks. Lipid profiles, inflammatory biomarkers, and microbiota composition were analyzed at the end of the experiment. Rats fed an HFD exhibited increased body weight and disordered lipid metabolism. In contrast, combined BL and XOS supplementation inhibited body weight gain and returned lipid metabolism to normal. Furthermore, BL and XOS administration changed the gut microbiota composition and modulated specific bacteria such as Prevotellaceae, Desulfovibrionaceae, and Ruminococcaceae. In addition, supplements of combined BL and XOS obviously reduced the serum LPS level, which was significantly related to microbial variations. Our findings suggest that modulation of the gut microbiota as a result of probiotic BL and prebiotic XOS supplementation has a positive effect on HFD-induced obesity in rats.

Highlights

Obesity is a global epidemic; the incidence of which is 10.7% in China, 12.8% in the European Union, and 30.4% in the USA [1,2,3]
Our results showed that high-fat diet (HFD) had induced significant increases in final body weight and body weight gain after day 6 compared with the control group (P < 0:0001; Figures 1(a) and 1(b))
The results presented here showed that high-fat diet- (HFD-)induced rats had a relatively higher Firmicutes to Bacteroidetes (F/B) ratio compared to the control rats, but these could be inverted by administering XOS or the combination of Bacillus licheniformis Zhengchangsheng® (BL) and XOS (Figure 5(b))

Summary

Introduction

Obesity is a global epidemic; the incidence of which is 10.7% in China, 12.8% in the European Union, and 30.4% in the USA [1,2,3]. Epidemiologic studies have shown that obesity imposes a heavy burden on national health care systems because it is tightly associated with chronic illnesses, including type II diabetes, cardiovascular disease, cancer, and fatty liver disease [5]. There is a growing evidence to show that alteration of gut microbiota composition may induce low-grade inflammation and is identified as an important element in close association with the obesity and obesity-induced metabolic disorders [6,7,8,9]. Microbiota-induced low-grade inflammation is mainly induced by lipopolysaccharides (LPS), increased plasma levels of which are sufficient to trigger obesity [10, 11]. Two factors may contribute to the increased entry of LPS into the body, resulting in metabolic endotoxemia and eventually obesity. The gut microbiota represents a potential therapeutic target for the development of drugs or nutritional interventions for obesity

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