By admin 
11/05/2024
By means of Karen Angelo
For optimal health, omega-3 fatty acids stand out as an important nutrient for people to consume. These essential fats fight inflammation, promote brain health and protect the heart. For people in high-stress jobs, such as those in the U.S. military, omega-3 fatty acids can help maintain peak performance during the most stressful times.
Omega-3 fatty acids, found primarily in fish, are not the easiest nutrient for military personnel to consume in food. The stability of fatty acids often deteriorates as a result of high temperatures. Besides, some people don’t like fish.
Assoc. Prof. Kelsey Mangano of Biomedical and Nutritional Sciences in the Zuckerberg College of Health Sciences received a $900,000 grant from Harnessing Emerging Research Opportunities to Empower Soldiers (HEROES), a joint research and development initiative of UMass Lowell and the United States Army Combat Capabilities Development Command Soldier Center (DEVCOM), to study the natural production of omega-3 fatty acids.
“Identifying natural bacteria that have the potential to produce omega-3 fatty acids is the first step toward developing probiotics that, when ingested, will remain in the body, live long and naturally will stimulate the production of these healthy fats,” says Mangaan. “The results of this study may pave the way for future testing of a probiotic in human food.”
The interdisciplinary research team, a partnership between industry, academia and government, includes experts in microbiology, nutrition, immunology and data science to investigate the microbes most likely to produce omega-3 fatty acids.
Gregory Weber, research biologist and member of the Functional Food and Nutrition Intervention Team at DEVCOM, will work with the team to provide science-related insights tailored to military applications.
Industry partner Aviwell, a life sciences startup housed on the UML campus of the Massachusetts Medical Device Development Center (M2D2), will apply artificial intelligence and machine learning techniques to run hundreds of thousands of combinations of bacteria to find the most likely bacterial ecologies which produce omega-3 fatty acids.
“Aviwell uses data science to uncover the truth that already exists in nature,” said CEO Mouli Ramani. “We are excited to collaborate on this project with UMass Lowell researchers and DEVCOM. We will use our proprietary Discovery Platform to analyze the complete genetic information of the bacteria and the molecules they release. This will allow us to identify specific bacterial ecologies that produce omega-3 fatty acids.”
The intestines are home to a vast army of approximately 100 trillion microbes, both healthy and unhealthy. Previous studies have shown that certain bacteria found in the human gut affect digestion, immune function and overall health. A combination of bacteria may be able to produce omega-3 fatty acids that can then be absorbed into the bloodstream.
This latest study will attempt to identify the most efficient bacteria that produce omega-3 fatty acids.
“We know that certain types of fish contain high amounts of omega-3 fatty acids, partly due to the microbes that live in the fish,” says Mangano. “We will collect stool samples from people who eat an abundance of fish to identify bacteria that thrive in the human gut in response to diets rich in fish.”
An expert on human gut health, Assoc. Prof. Soumita Das of Biomedical and Food Sciences and deputy director of the Center for Pathogen Research and Training will isolate bacterial DNA from stool samples of people who eat a diet rich in fish and have high levels of omega-3 fatty acids in their blood.
“By harnessing the body’s own microbial ecosystem, we may be able to find a natural, sustainable way to increase omega-3 levels and thus improve the physical and mental health of military personnel,” says Das, who conducts research to the interaction between microbes and the human body during infections of diseases. the digestive system to understand the mechanisms of these infections, how the body fights them and find ways to prevent or treat them.
Jack Lepine, manager and chief scientist of UMass Lowell’s Next Generation Sequencing & Genomics Lab, will sequence the bacteria collected in human feces and reveal the genetic code to analyze its structure and function.
The research team also includes Assoc. Dean for Research and Graduate Studies Prof. Dhimiter Bello of the Zuckerberg College of Health Sciences and Asst. Chemistry professor Pengyuan Liu, who will test the fatty acid profiles of zebrafish to see if higher levels of omega-3 fatty acids are produced. This combined effort will best identify potential bacteria that are successful in producing omega-3 fatty acids.
“Solving complex problems, such as how bacteria residing in the gut microbiome produce omega-3 fatty acids, requires the power of interdisciplinary to unlock new insights,” says Bello. “By working with Aviwell, an industry leader and innovator in life sciences and machine learning, we can accelerate the pace of discovery and translation to real-world applications.”
In collaboration with the Army’s DEVCOM Soldier Center, Combat Feeding Division, Mangano will lead an advisory board to identify the most effective and acceptable delivery system of the probiotics to soldiers and plan future related research.