A discovery on a vaccine against inflammatory bowel disease has been announced on the Inserm website.
Researchers at the Cochin Institute have succeeded in protecting animals against chronic inflammatory diseases such as Crohn’s disease and even against diabetes or obesity.
Flagellin, responsible for spreading bacteria, targeted
Scientists have been interested in flagellin, a protein that promotes the motility of bacteria within the intestinal flora, despite the layer of mucus supposed to protect it. The researchers therefore stimulated the production of antibodies naturally present in this mucus in order to create an additional barrier against the flagellin, which reduces the risk of inflammation.
Tests carried out on mice have proven that this “immunization against flagellin allowed animals to be significantly protected against intestinal inflammation”.
Since excess flagellin is also responsible for other pathologies such as diabetes or obesity, the researchers also vaccinated mice “exposed to a high-fat diet”. Result: the vaccinated animals did not become obese unlike the unvaccinated.
After successful animal tests, soon a vaccine for humans?
“This vaccine strategy is possible in humans, since such microbiota abnormalities have been observed in patients with inflammatory and metabolic diseases. For this, we are currently working on a way to locally administer flagellin to the intestinal mucosa,” said Benoît Chassaing, Inserm researcher, head of the team that carried out this research.
Scientists are now studying the possibility of cure subjects who already have a chronic inflammatory disease or metabolic disorders.
