The protective effects of lentinan may be associated with inhibition of inflammation, production of SCFAs, and alterations of microbiota composition.

Temozolomide plays a critical role in curing glioma at present. The purpose of this work was to develop a suitable drug delivery system which could prolong the half-life, improve the brain targeting, and reduce the systemic effect of the drug. Temozolomide-liposomes were formulated by the method of proliposomes. They were found to be relatively uniform in size of 156.70 ± 11.40 nm with a narrow polydispersity index (PI) of 0.29 ± 0.04. The average drug entrapment efficiency and loading capacity were 35.45 ± 1.48% and 2.81 ± 0.20%, respectively. The pH of temozolomide-liposomes was 6.46. In vitro release studies were conducted by a dynamic dialysis. The results showed that temozolomide released slowly from liposomes compared with the solution group. The release behavior of temozolomide-liposomes was in line with First-order kinetics and Weibull equation. The pharmacokinetics study was evaluated by pharmacokinetics parameters. The t(1/2β) and MRT of temozolomide-liposomes were 3.57 times and 1.27 times greater than that of temozolomide solution. The Cmax and AUC values of temozolomide-liposomes were 1.10 times and 1.55 times greater than that of temozolomide solution. The results of pharmacokinetics study showed temozolomide-liposomes prolonged the in vivo circulation time and increased AUC. Furthermore, the biodistribution in mice showed that temozolomide-liposomes preferentially decreased the accumulation of temozolomide in heart and lung and increased the drug concentration in brain after i.v. injection, which implied that temozolomide-liposomes improved the therapeutic effect in the brain and reduced the toxicity in lung and heart.

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Xylooligosaccharide (XOS) has been considered to be an effective prebiotic, but its exact mechanisms remain unknown. This research was conducted to evaluate the effects of XOS on pig intestinal bacterial community and mucosal barrier using a lipopolysaccharide (LPS)-caused gut damage model. Twenty-four weaned pigs were assigned to 4 treatments in a 2 × 2 factorial design involving diet (with or without XOS) and immunological challenge (saline or LPS). After 21 d of feeding 0% or 0.02% commercial XOS product, piglets were treated with saline or LPS. After that, blood, small intestinal mucosa and cecal digesta were obtained. Dietary XOS enhanced intestinal mucosal integrity demonstrated by higher villus height, villus height-to-crypt depth ratio, disaccharidase activities and claudin-1 protein expression and lower crypt depth. XOS also caused down-regulation of the gene expression of toll-like receptor 4 and nucleotide-binding oligomerization domain protein signaling, accompanied with decreased pro-inflammatory cytokines and cyclooxygenase 2 contents or mRNA expression and increased heat shock protein 70 mRNA and protein expression. Additionally, increased Bacteroidetes and decreased Firmicutes relative abundance were observed in the piglets fed with XOS. At the genus level, XOS enriched the relative abundance of beneficial bacteria, e.g., Faecalibacterium , Lactobacillus , and Prevotella . Moreover, XOS enhanced short chain fatty acids contents and inhibited histone deacetylases. The correlation analysis of the combined datasets implied some potential connections between the intestinal microbiota and pro-inflammatory cytokines or cecal metabolites. These results suggest that XOS inhibits inflammatory response and beneficially modifies microbes and metabolites of the hindgut to protect the intestine from inflammation-related injury.

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The effect of holly polyphenols (HP) on intestinal inflammation and microbiota composition was evaluated in a piglet model of lipopolysaccharide (LPS)-induced intestinal injury. A total of twenty-four piglets were used in a 2 × 2 factorial design including diet type and LPS challenge. After 16 d of feeding with a basal diet supplemented with or without 250 mg/kg HP, pigs were challenged with LPS (100 μg/kg body weight) or an equal volume of saline for 4 h, followed by analysis of disaccharidase activities, gene expression levels of several representative tight junction proteins and inflammatory mediators, the SCFA concentrations and microbiota composition in intestinal contents as well as proinflammatory cytokine levels in plasma. Our results indicated that HP enhanced intestinal disaccharidase activities and reduced plasma proinflammatory cytokines including TNF-α and IL-6 in LPS-challenged piglets. Moreover, HP up-regulated mRNA expression of intestinal tight junction proteins such as claudin-1 and occludin. In addition, bacterial 16S rRNA gene sequencing showed that HP altered hindgut microbiota composition by enriching Prevotella and enhancing SCFA production following LPS challenge. These results collectively suggest that HP is capable of alleviating LPS-triggered intestinal injury by improving intestinal disaccharidase activities, barrier function and SCFA production, while reducing intestinal inflammation.