Abstract
As common mental disorders, depression and anxiety impact people all around the world. Recent studies have found that the gut microbiome plays an important role in mental health. It is becoming possible to treat mental disorders by regulating the composition of the gut microbiota. Bacillus licheniformis is a probiotic used to treat gut diseases through balancing the gut microbiome during lasting years. Considering the role of gut microbiota in the gut-brain axis, this study used chronic unpredictable mild stress (CUMS) model rats to explore whether Bacillus licheniformis can prevent and treat depression and anxiety. We found that B. licheniformis reduced the depressive-like and anxiety-like behaviours of the rats during the CUMS process. Meanwhile, B. licheniformis changed the gut microbiota composition; increased the short chain fatty acids (SCFAs) in the colon, decreased kynurenine, norepinephrine, and glutamate levels; and increased the tryptophan, dopamine, epinephrine, and γ-aminobutyric acid (GABA) in the brain. After correlation analysis, we found Parabacteroides, Anaerostipes, Ruminococcus-2, and Blautia showed significant correlation with neurotransmitters and SCFAs, indicating the gut microbiome plays an important role in B. licheniformis reducing depressive-like behaviours. Therefore, this study suggested B. licheniformis may prevent depressive-like and anxiety-like behaviours while regulating the gut microbiota composition and increasing the SCFA levels in the colon to alter the levels of the neurotransmitters in the brain.
Key points
• B. licheniformis reduced depressive-like and anxiety-like behaviours induced by the chronic unpredictable mild stress.
• GABA levels in the brain are assonated with B. licheniformis regulating depressive-like and anxiety-like behaviours.
• Gut microbiota composition alteration followed by metabolic changes may play a role in the GABA levels increase.
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Data availability
The data that support the findings of this study are openly available in China National Center for Bioinformation/Bei**g Institute of Genomics, Chinese Academy of Sciences (GSA: CRA009266) at https://ngdc.cncb.ac.cn/gsa.
Change history
27 June 2023
A Correction to this paper has been published: https://doi.org/10.1007/s00253-023-12643-9
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This work was financially supported by the grant from the Bei**g Natural Science Foundation (7222112) and National Natural Science Foundation of China (82101626).
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SF, ZH, and YZ designed the study. ZH supervised the study. SF, CM, and YL performed the experiments. SF, CM, YL, YY, AL, YZ, and ZH performed data analysis. SF, CM, ZH, and YZ wrote the paper. SF, CM, YL, YY, AL, YZ, and ZH contributed to the editing and revision of the paper. All authors read and approved the final manuscript.
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This study was approved by the Biological and Medical Ethics Committee of Beihang University (Bei**g, China). Animal experiments were performed according to the National Institute of Health Guide for the Care and Use of Laboratory Animals.
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Feng, S., Meng, C., Liu, Y. et al. Bacillus licheniformis prevents and reduces anxiety-like and depression-like behaviours. Appl Microbiol Biotechnol 107, 4355–4368 (2023). https://doi.org/10.1007/s00253-023-12580-7
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s00253-023-12580-7