Unraveling the Microbial Mechanisms Underlying the Psychobiotic Potential of a Bifidobacterium breve Strain

Abstract

Scope: The antidepressant-like effect of psychobiotics has been observed in both pre-clinical and clinical studies, but the molecular mechanisms of action are largely unclear. To address this, the psychobiotic strain Bifidobacterium breve CCFM1025 is investigated for its genomic features, metabolic features, and gut microbial and metabolic modulation effect. Methods and Results: Unlike B. breve FHLJDQ3M5, CCFM1025 significantly decreases the chronically stressed mice's depressive-like behaviors and neurological abnormalities. CCFM1025 has more genes encoding glycoside hydrolases (GHs) when comparing to FHLJDQ3M5's genome, which means CCFM1025 has a superior carbohydrate utilization capacity and living adaptivity in the gut. CCFM1025 also produces higher levels of neuromodulatory metabolites, including hypoxanthine, tryptophan, and nicotinate. The administration of CCFM1025 reshapes the gut microbiome of chronically stressed mice. It results in higher cecal xanthine, tryptophan, short-chain fatty acid levels, and enhances fatty acid and tryptophan biosynthesis capability in the gut-brain interaction (identified by in silico analyses) than FHLJDQ3M5-treated mice. Conclusions: Genomic and metabolic features involving GHs and neuromodulatory metabolites may determine the antidepressant-like effect of B. breve CCFM1025. Psychobiotics' characterization in this manner may provide guidelines for developing novel psychopharmacological agents in the future.

Recent Development of Probiotic Bifidobacteria for Treating Human Diseases

“…These findings suggest that Bifidobacteria may confer resistance to stress. B. breve CCFM1025 showed antidepressant-like effect in chronically stressed mice due probably to the capacity of utilizing various carbohydrates and producing neuroactive metabolites, such as tryptophan, hypoxanthine, and nicotinate ( Tian et al, 2021 ). B. breve CCFM1025 can also reverse chronic stress-induced depressive symptoms ( Tian et al, 2020 ).…”

Consumption of Butylated Starch Alleviates the Chronic Restraint Stress-Induced Neurobehavioral and Gut Barrier Deficits Through Reshaping the Gut Microbiota

“…A prior oral supplementation of the SCFA mixture (acetate, propionate, and butyrate) could prevent the mice from the neurobehavioral deficits induced by the repeated psychosocial stress, including depression and anxietylike behaviors and impaired gut barrier function (10). In addition, our previous studies also proved that the SCFAs facilitate the biosynthesis of gut serotonin and the 5-hydroxytryptophan's circulation, and this mechanism may account for the antidepressant-like effect of some psychobiotic strains such as the Bifidobacterium longum CCFM687 and Bifidobacterium breve CCFM1025 (11)(12)(13).…”

Multi-Omics Reveals the Inhibition of Lactiplantibacillus plantarum CCFM8724 in Streptococcus mutans-Candida albicans Mixed-Species Biofilms

“…This helps to explain why intracellular carbohydrate metabolism of dualspecies biofilm (Figure 2) in the treated group is the most variable. As shown in Figure 7E, F, the GH family, the highest proportion of the two strains, is a critical enzyme group accounting for the bacterial adaptation capacity to the host's environment, through hydrolysing the dietary and host-produced carbohydrates [38]. In addition, L. plantarum CCFM8724 has a higher CBM level, which can combine with GH family to degrade chitin or peptidoglycan to inhibit the pathogen growth, especially the CBM50 (Figure 7G).…”