Skip to main page content
U.S. flag

An official website of the United States government

Dot gov

The .gov means it’s official.
Federal government websites often end in .gov or .mil. Before sharing sensitive information, make sure you’re on a federal government site.

Https

The site is secure.
The https:// ensures that you are connecting to the official website and that any information you provide is encrypted and transmitted securely.

Access keys NCBI Homepage MyNCBI Homepage Main Content Main Navigation
. 2024 Nov 27:11:1510318.
doi: 10.3389/fnut.2024.1510318. eCollection 2024.

Effect of synbiotic supplementation on obesity and gut microbiota in obese adults: a double-blind randomized controlled trial

Xiaokang Niu #  1 , Qi Zhang #  2 , Julong Liu #  3 , Yuyang Zhao  1 , Nan Shang  1 , Shusen Li  3 , Yinghua Liu  4 , Wei Xiong  5 , Erna Sun  3 , Yong Zhang  4 , Hongfeng Zhao  3 , Yixuan Li  1 , Pengjie Wang  1 , Bing Fang  2 , Liang Zhao  2 , Juan Chen  1 , Fuqing Wang  6 , Guofang Pang  7 , Chenyuan Wang  3 , Jingjing He  2 , Ran Wang  1
Affiliations

Effect of synbiotic supplementation on obesity and gut microbiota in obese adults: a double-blind randomized controlled trial

Xiaokang Niu et al. Front Nutr. .

Abstract

Background: Synbiotics, combining specific probiotics and selected prebiotics, may benefit health issues like obesity, but evidence remains inconsistent.

Objective: This study aimed to verify the effect of a pre-screened synbiotics combination [containing Bifidobacterium animalis subsp. lactis MN-Gup (MN-Gup), galacto-oligosaccharides (GOS) and xylo-oligosaccharides (XOS)] on obesity in the population.

Methods: In a randomized, double-blind, placebo-controlled trial, 80 individuals with obesity consumed daily synbiotics (containing MN-Gup 1 × 1011 CFU/day, GOS 0.7 g/day, and XOS 0.7 g/day) or placebo for 12 weeks. Body composition, blood lipids, serum hormone, bile acids, and gut microbiota were measured pre-and post-intervention.

Results: Synbiotics supplementation significantly decreased body fat percentage, waist, and serum low-density lipoprotein cholesterol (LDL-C), increased peptide YY, cholecystokinin, oxyntomodulin, GSH (glutathione peroxidase) in individuals with obesity. Additionally, synbiotic supplementation led to an enrichment of beneficial bacteria and bile acids chenodeoxycholic acid (CDCA). Bifidobacterium and Romboutsia were significantly positively correlated with CDCA. A more favorable effect was observed in individuals with obesity and abnormal LDL-C compared to those without dyslipidemia.

Conclusion: Twelve-week synbiotics intervention reduced body fat percentage, waist, and serum LDL-C, especially in individuals with obesity and abnormal LDL-C. The possible mechanisms may be related to changes in gut microbiota, bile acids and gut hormones.

Clinical trial registration: Chictr.org.cn, identifier ChiCTR2200064156.

Keywords: Bifidobacterium animalis subsp. lactis MN-Gup; gut microbiota; obesity; randomized controlled trial; synbiotics.

PubMed Disclaimer

Conflict of interest statement

JL, SL, ES, HZ, and CW were employed by Mengniu Hi-Tech Dairy Product Beijing Co., Ltd. FW was employed by Tibet Tianhong Science and Technology Co., Ltd. The remaining authors declare that the research was conducted in the absence of any commercial or financial relationships that could be construed as a potential conflict of interest.

Figures

Figure 1
Figure 1
Effects of MN-Gup-GOS-XOS on gut microbiota and bile acids of individuals with obesity. V0: baseline, V1: post-intervention. (A,B) The average relative abundance of bacteria at the phylum and the genus level. (C) LEfSe analysis of gut microbiota at post-intervention. The length of the bar represents the log10 transformed LDA score. The threshold on the logarithmic LDA score for discriminative features was set to 2.0. (D) Bile acids in individuals at baseline and post-intervention. TUDCA, tauroursodeoxycholic acid; TCA, taurocholate acid; GUDCA, glycoursodeoxycholic acid; GCA, glycocholic acid; TCDCA, taurochenodeoxycholic acid; TDCA, taurodeoxycholic acid; GCDCA, glycochenodeoxycholic acid; GDCA, glycoursodeoxycholic acid; CA, cholic acid; HDCA, hyodeoxycholic acid; UDCA, ursodeoxycholic acid; TLCA, taurolithocholic acid; GLCA, glycolithocholic acid; CDCA, chenodeoxycholic acid; DCA, deoxycholic acid; LCA, lithocholic acid. (E–J) Pearson correlation heatmap of bile acids and gut microbiota.
Figure 2
Figure 2
Gut microbiota of subgroup analysis. (A) Differences in gut microbiota (genus level) between obese individuals with abnormal LDL-C and obese individuals without dyslipidemia at baseline. (B) LEfSe analysis of gut microbiota in obese individuals with abnormal LDL-C at post-intervention. (C) LEfSe analysis of gut microbiota in obese individuals without dyslipidemia at post-intervention. PD, placebo group in obese individuals with abnormal LDL-C; SD, synbiotic group in obese individuals with abnormal LDL-C; PO, placebo group in obese individuals without dyslipidemia; SO, synbiotic group in obese individuals without dyslipidemia.
See this image and copyright information in PMC

Similar articles

See all similar articles

Cited by

References

    1. NCD Risk Factor Collaboration (NCD-RisC) . Trends in adult body-mass index in 200 countries from 1975 to 2014: a pooled analysis of 1,698 population-based measurement studies with 19.2 million participants. Lancet. (2016) 387:1377–96. doi: 10.1016/S0140-6736(16)30054-X, PMID: - DOI - PMC - PubMed
    1. Briel M, Ferreira-Gonzalez I, You JJ, Karanicolas PJ, Akl EA, Wu P, et al. . Association between change in high density lipoprotein cholesterol and cardiovascular disease morbidity and mortality: systematic review and meta-regression analysis. BMJ. (2009) 338:b92. doi: 10.1136/bmj.b92, PMID: - DOI - PMC - PubMed
    1. Abenavoli L, Scarpellini E, Colica C, Boccuto L, Salehi B, Sharifi-Rad J, et al. . Gut microbiota and obesity: a role for probiotics. Nutrients. (2019) 11:2690. doi: 10.3390/nu11112690, PMID: - DOI - PMC - PubMed
    1. Luoto R, Kalliomäki M, Laitinen K, Isolauri E. The impact of perinatal probiotic intervention on the development of overweight and obesity: follow-up study from birth to 10 years. Int J Obes. (2010) 34:1531–7. doi: 10.1038/ijo.2010.50, PMID: - DOI - PubMed
    1. Nagata S, Chiba Y, Wang C, Yamashiro Y. The effects of the Lactobacillus casei strain on obesity in children: a pilot study. Benef Microbes. (2017) 8:535–43. doi: 10.3920/BM2016.0170, PMID: - DOI - PubMed

LinkOut - more resources