Material Engineering in Gut Microbiome and Human Health

Abstract

Tremendous progress has been made in the past decade regarding our understanding of the gut microbiome’s role in human health. Currently, however, a comprehensive and focused review marrying the two distinct fields of gut microbiome and material research is lacking. To bridge the gap, the current paper discusses critical aspects of the rapidly emerging research topic of “material engineering in the gut microbiome and human health.” By engaging scientists with diverse backgrounds in biomaterials, gut-microbiome axis, neuroscience, synthetic biology, tissue engineering, and biosensing in a dialogue, our goal is to accelerate the development of research tools for gut microbiome research and the development of therapeutics that target the gut microbiome. For this purpose, state-of-the-art knowledge is presented here on biomaterial technologies that facilitate the study, analysis, and manipulation of the gut microbiome, including intestinal organoids, gut-on-chip models, hydrogels for spatial mapping of gut microbiome compositions, microbiome biosensors, and oral bacteria delivery systems. In addition, a discussion is provided regarding the microbiome-gut-brain axis and the critical roles that biomaterials can play to investigate and regulate the axis. Lastly, perspectives are provided regarding future directions on how to develop and use novel biomaterials in gut microbiome research, as well as essential regulatory rules in clinical translation. In this way, we hope to inspire research into future biomaterial technologies to advance gut microbiome research and gut microbiome-based theragnostics.

The gut microbiome dysbiosis and regulation by fecal microbiota transplantation: umbrella review

“…(3) Optimize FMT preparation, delivery and dosing through standardization and innovation. Engineered bacterial groups or bacteriophage-based therapy with more precise delivery and control can be developed through FMT (Yang et al, 2022;Airola et al, 2023). Engineered bacteria combined with gut bacteria and functional magnetic nanoparticles provide new ideas for precise regulation of gut bacteria.…”

Mucosa‐Mimetic Materials for the Study of Intestinal Homeostasis and Disease

“…The gut microbiome plays a significant role in human health and various diseases. [ 41 ] In fact, gut and microbiome dysfunction and dysbiosis are also commonly observed in patients with neurological disorders such as Parkinson's disease, [ 42 ] Multiple Sclerosis, [ 43 ] Autism Spectrum Disorder, [ 44 ] and Alzheimer's disease [ 45 ] and often develop prior to the onset of neurological symptoms, although the relationships between microbiome and the neurological disease have yet to be determined. [ 46 ] It is not known what variations in mucus phenotype may lead to the observed changes in microbe composition, although hypotheses for mechanisms include misfolding of mucin proteins, alterations in the signaling pathways responsible for gastrointestinal stem cell maturation and goblet cell development, and changes in expression of vesicle‐associated proteins involved in both mucus release and neurotransmitter systems.…”

Microfluidic Brain‐on‐a‐Chip: From Key Technology to System Integration and Application

“…For example, the villus-shaped structure formed by collagen hydrogels crosslinked by carbodiimide chemistry on a BBB chip can promote the upregulated expression of transporter proteins and a higher TEER. [82] Several studies have shown that the geometry of hydrogels can enhance organogenesis. [83] Decellularized ECM Hydrogel: Decellularized ECM (dECM) hydrogels retain natural proteins such as collagen I, collagen IV, and laminin.…”