The Impact of Gut Microbiota Disorders on the Blood-Brain Barrier

Wei Tang; Huifeng Zhu; Yanmei Feng; Rui Guo; Dong Wan

doi:10.2147/IDR.S254403

The Impact of Gut Microbiota Disorders on the Blood-Brain Barrier

Infect Drug Resist. 2020 Sep 29:13:3351-3363. doi: 10.2147/IDR.S254403. eCollection 2020.

Authors

Wei Tang¹, Huifeng Zhu^#², Yanmei Feng³, Rui Guo¹, Dong Wan^#¹

Affiliations

¹ Department of Emergency & Critical Care Medicine, The First Affiliated Hospital of Chongqing Medical University, Chongqing 400016, People's Republic of China.
² College of Pharmaceutical Sciences & Chinese Medicine, Southwest University, Chongqing 400716, People's Republic of China.
³ Department of Respiratory and Critical Care Medicine, The First Affiliated Hospital of Chongqing Medical University, Chongqing 400016, People's Republic of China.

^# Contributed equally.

Abstract

The gut microbiota is symbiotic with the human host and has been extensively studied in recent years resulting in increasing awareness of the effects of the gut microbiota on human health. In this review, we summarize the current evidence for the effects of gut microbes on the integrity of the cerebral blood-brain barrier (BBB), focusing on the pathogenic impact of gut microbiota disorders. Based on our description and summarization of the effects of the gut microbiota and its metabolites on the nervous, endocrine, and immune systems and related signaling pathways and the resulting destruction of the BBB, we suggest that regulating and supplementing the intestinal microbiota as well as targeting immune cells and inflammatory mediators are required to protect the BBB.

Keywords: blood–brain barrier; metabolites; microbiota.

Publication types

Review

Grants and funding

This work was supported by grants from the National Natural Science Foundation of China (81873034), the Natural Science Foundation Project of CQ CSTC (cstc2014jcyjA10083 & cstc2018jcyjAX0158), the Medical Research Project of Chongqing Health Commission (2015MSXM014 & 2016MSXM198).