Lab News & Events

Dietary prophage inducers and antimicrobials: toward landscaping the human gut microbiome

Jul 25, 2019

Recent work published in the journal Gut Microbes, Boling et. al. examined the effects of 117 commonly consumed foods, plant extracts, and additives on the growth and prophage induction capacity of bacterial species representing the two major phyla of the human gut.  The research was enabled by the development of two novel experimental techniques – one to mass-analyze bacterial growth curves, and another to quantify induced prophage with flow cytometry.  These studies show that the compounds tested differentially affect bacterial growth, and likely human gut microbiome composition.  Several prophage inducing agents were also identified including stevia, uva ursi, and propolis.  Antiviral compounds were also identified. The methods and results present novel tools toward the eventual landscaping of the human gut microbiome.

A link to the full, open access paper can be found below.

News Article