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Improvement of food safety and quality through the use of interactive and competitive bindings of food lectins and bacterial adhesins in the gut

Ziel

Bacterial binding in the small intestine is mainly through fimbrial and surface adhesins. As food lectins also bind in a similar, sugar-specific manner, interactions between lectins from the food and bacteria may be competitive, additive or synergistic. As a result, bacterial ecology and gut function may be modified and improved by the inclusion of natural additives such as lectins or saccharides in the diet.

The project's basic aim is therefore to find specific plant lectins and/or polysaccharides which, as natural dietary supplements, will abolish or minimise harmful bacterial colonization of the small intestine and other parts of the gastrointestinal tract.

Participating institutions from Member Countries : B, D, E, NL, UK
Interested Third Countries : YU

This project also belongs to the EC research and development programme, FLAIR.

CURRENT STATUS

In the first two years, the two sub-groups will concentrate on two main research lines. First, the effects of a number of plant lectins, including those from the seeds of kidney and soya bean and bacterial adhesins of E. coli will be studied in vitro with various human cell lines in cell cultures. The second approach, will test the effects of a number of plant lectins, covering most of the sugar specificities found in nature, on the rat small intestine bacterial binding in vivo as well as on its morphology and function. The rest of the programme will test ways of blocking the binding of bacterial adhesins to the gut wall with selected plant lectins or saccharides both in vitro and in vivo. The programme will be subdivided into two subgroups :

- In Vitro Studies Subgroup
This subgroup will use the human intestinal cell-line, Caco-2, to study the effects of plant lectins and bacterial adhesins on the morphology and biochemistry of this cell. The subgroup will be made up of group-members based in Utrecht (Prof. MOUWEN's grou), Brussels (Dr.VAN DRIESSCHE and Prof. KANAREK) and Uccle (Drs. POHL and LINTERMANS), with contributions from The Rowett Research Institute (Drs. BARDOCZ and PUSZTAI) and Munich (Dr. SCHUMACHER).

- In Vivo Studies Subgroup
This subgroup's research will concentrate on in vivo testing, initially with rats (Drs. PUSZTAI, BARDOCZ and EWEN), of plant lectins isolated at Leuven (Dr. PEUMAN's group). The effect of lectins and saccharides (Dr. RUBIO, Madrid) on the function, morphology and bacterial flora of the small intestine (Drs. PUSZTAI, BARDOCZ and EWEN) and that of other organs, including the kidneys, pancreas, liver and the immune system (Dr. SCHUMACHER, Munich) will be tested. If possible these studies will be extended to include tests on pigs (TNO, Wageningen and Dr. FOWLER, Aberdeen). Potential transgenic crop plants (Dr. GATEHOUSE, Durham), based on lectin genes from Leuven (Drs. VAN DAMME and PEUMANS) will be included in nutritional tests on rats.

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ROWETT RESEARCH INSTITUTE
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GREENBURN ROAD
AB21 9SB ABERDEEN
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