Muscle loss is a common concern with both men and women as they age and it’s been linked to fractures, falls and disability. But new research on mice indicates that gut microbes may be a factor in regulating muscle mass and function, providing a potential opportunity to address the problem.
Examining the loss of strength and muscle mass
Researchers at Nanyang Technological University in Singapore looked at normal, healthy mice with gut microbes and at germ-free mice who had no gut microbes. They found that:
- The mice without gut microbes produced less energy.
- The mice without gut microbes had weaker muscles.
- Transplanting gut microbes (from the healthy mice) into the mice without gut microbes increased their strength and muscle mass.
- The mice who received the gut microbes had a partial restoration of muscle function and growth.
“These results further strengthen the growing evidence of gut microbes acting as crucial gatekeepers to human health,” explains Sven Pettersson, the senior study author and a professor in the Lee Kong Chian School of Medicine at Nanyang Technological University, “and provide new insight into muscle mass maintenance with respect to aging.”
Generating energy in muscles
The researchers put the mice through a variety of challenges, including running as the speed was increased and holding weights that progressively got heavier.
They found that the mice without gut microbes had a difficult time generating energy in the muscles. But why?
It seems that their muscles had a harder time making and use mitochondria to give them energy. But when the gut microbes from the healthy mice were transplanted into the germ-free mice, the enzyme’s activity increased, allowing the muscles to make more energy.
Although mice and humans are very similar in terms of physiology, the researchers are curious to see if the results can be replicated in humans.
The results of the study were published in Science Translational Medicine.
