Gut microbiota maintains body temperature in cold conditions: Study

Beijing, March 8 (IANS) Ever wondered how animals respond to exposure to low temperature conditions? It's the gut microbiota that plays an important role in regulating the body temperature of animals, finds a study.

The gut microbiota has diverse impacts on human and animal physiology and health.

In the study, researchers from the Chinese Academy of Sciences focused on the gut microbiota's role in thermoregulation.

It is well known that animals sustain their body temperature by activating heat production from a specialised tissue known as brown adipose tissue.

To evaluate the function of gut microbiota in the activation of brown adipose tissue, the team conducted experiments on mice and used different antibiotic recipes to eradicate gut microbiota in mice.

The mice lacking gut microbiota showed impaired thermoregulation, said lead author John R. Speakman from the Academy's Institute of Genetics and Developmental Biology.

For those mice whose gut microbiota was destroyed by antibiotics, supplemented gut bacteria helped partially restore their heat-producing ability, Xinhua news agency reported.

Although the experiment was conducted in mice, it has important implications for human health research.

Elderly people have many problems with body temperature regulation in cold environments.

More research should be done to learn if changes in the human microbiome with age contribute to this effect, and if modulating microbiome in bodies will help elderly people better handle cold exposure, according to the study published in Cell Reports journal.