Neanderthals gut microbiota already contained some beneficial microorganisms that are also found in our own gut. An international research group led by the University of Bologna achieved this result by extracting and analyzing ancient DNA from 50,000-year-old fecal sediments sampled at the El Salt archaeological site, near Alicante. (in Spain).
Published in Communication biology, their paper advances the hypothesis that ancestral components of human microbiota have inhabited the human gastrointestinal tract since then before the separation between the Homo Sapiens and Neanderthals that occurred more than 700,000 years ago.
“These results allow us to understand which parts of the human gut microbiota are essential for our health, as they are also essential features of our biology from an evolutionary perspective” explained Marco Candela, professor Department of Pharmacy and Biotechnology of the University of Bologna, which coordinated the study.
“Today there is a progressive reduction in our microbiota diversity due to the context of our lives today: the findings of this research group could guide us in designing solutions that are suitable for diet and method- life to counteract this wonder “.
The state of the “modern” microbiota
The gut microbiota is the collection of trillions of symbiont microorganisms that reside in our gastrointestinal tract. It represents an essential part of our biology and performs important functions in our bodies, such as regulating our metabolism and the immune system and protecting us from pathogenic microorganisms.
Recent studies have shown how some novel features – such as consumption of processed foods, drug use, life in hyper-healthy environments – lead to a drastic reduction of biodiversity in the gut microbiota. This decline is largely due to the loss of a set of microorganisms called “old friends”.
The process of microbiota gut shedding in today’s urban areas could be a real awakening. This process of degradation became particularly frightening if it involved the loss of those microbiota components that are critical to our psychology. “
Simone Rampelli, First Author and Researcher Study, University of Bologna
Of course, there are some scary signs. For example, in the West, we are seeing a significant increase in cases of chronic inflammatory diseases, such as inflammatory bowel disease, metabolic syndrome, type 2 diabetes, and colorectal cancer.
How the “ancient” microbiota can help
How can we identify the parts of the gut microbiota that are more important for our health? And how can we protect them with targeted solutions? This was the starting point behind the idea of recognizing the ancestral traces of our microbiota – i.e. the heart of the human gut microbiota, which has been stable throughout our evolutionary history.
Today’s technology allows it to rise successfully in this challenge thanks to a new scientific field, paleomicrobiology, which studies ancient microorganisms from archaeological remains through the application of DNA .
The research group analyzed ancient DNA samples collected in El Salt (Spain), the site of many Neanderthals. To be more precise, they analyzed the old DNA extracted from 50,000-year-old sedimentary feces (the oldest sample of fecal material available to date).
In this way, they were able to combine the composition of microorganisms in the intestines of Neanderthals. Comparing the Neanderthals microbiota concordance with ours, many of the similarities arose.
“Through the study of ancient DNA, we were able to separate the heart of microorganisms from modern Homo sapiens,” explained Silvia Turroni, a researcher at the University of Bologna and the first author of the study. “This discovery allows us to say that these ancient microorganisms lived in the intestines of our species before they split between Sapiens and Neanderthals, which occurred about 700,000 years ago”.
Protects the microbiota
The ancestral components of human gut microbiota include many well-known bacteria (including Blautia, Dorea, Roseburia, Ruminococcus, and Faecalibacterium) that are fundamental to our health. In fact, by removing short-chain fatty acids from dietary fiber, these bacteria regulate our metabolic and immune balance.
There is also the Bifidobacterium: a microorganism that plays a key role in regulating our immune system, especially in early childhood. Finally, in the Neanderthal gut microbiota, researchers identified some of these “old friends”.
This confirms the researchers ’views on the ancestral nature of these components and their recent decline in human gut microbiota as a result of the context of modern life.
“In the current renewal scenario, which is experiencing a progressive reduction in microbiota diversity, this information could guide integrated diet and lifestyle strategies to control the microbiota. measures that are fundamental to protecting our health ”, concludes Candela.
“To this end, promoting sustainable lifestyles for our gut microbiota is extremely important, as it will help maintain the arrangements that are similar to our biology”.
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Magazine Reference:
Rampelli, S., et al. (2021) Components of the Neanderthal gut microbome were recovered from fecal sediments from El Salt. Communication Biology. doi.org/10.1038/s42003-021-01689-y.