Prebiotics & Fibers

Prebiotics and fibers exert their effects mainly at the level of the colon, by impacting the microbial community composition and metabolic activity. Our colonic simulators are able to provide detailed insight into the impact of your products on the microbiome of specific population groups (e.g. elderly, babies) as well as dysbiotic microbiomes (e.g. from IBD patients). Whenever relevant the simulation can be extended with a mucosal compartment.

The Colon-on-a-plate^® technology offers the highest throughput allowing the comparison of the impact of tens of products on the microbiome of tens of donors.

The mid-throughput short-term colon simulator offers the benefit of frequent sampling from the same colonic simulator and hence is particularly suited for providing insights in the kinetics of fermentation, cross feeding, gas production.

Finally, the SHIME^®  technology platform can generate an in-depth insight in the mechanism of action, the long-term effects of repeated dosing of prebiotics and fibers and the localization of these effects in the colon (luminal vs. mucosal niche / proximal vs. distal colon). Since the SHIME^® closely reproduces the anatomical segmentation, physiological conditions and microbiology of the gastrointestinal tract data generated in the SHIME^® are closely related to in vivo studies.

The impact of the fermentation of these product at the level of the gut-wall can be investigated by coupling the gut simulation with a wide array of cell lines to investigate for instance, gut barrier integrity (e.g. restoring the barrier integrity of a leaky gut), inflammation, immunomodulation, expression of tight junction genes and insulin resistance. Combination with the MetaKey^® metabolomics platform creates unlimited possibilities in investigation and quantification of a diverse range of metabolites which provide insight in potential health benefits.