L. CASEI CRL431 AND ITS CELLULAR WALL EFFECT ON THE THYMUS, BODY COMPOSITION CHANGES AND IMMUNE SYSTEM IN AN OBESITY MODEL

FLORENCIA BALCELLS; EVA VELEZ; SILVIA CAZORLA; CAROLINA MALDONADO; GABRIELA PERDIGON

Buenos Aires

Congreso; REUNION CONJUNTA DE SOCIEDADES DE BIOCIENCIA; 2017

Aim: to study the effect of L. casei 431 and/or its cell wall on the thymus restoration in obese mice. Five weeks old BALB/c mice were divided into 2 groups: Normal Control (NC) that received a conventional balanced diet and water, Obese Control (OC) fed a high fat diet (HFD). NC and OC were divided into sub-groups: N+Probiotic (NP) and O+Probiotic (OP) who received probiotic strain suspension for 12 weeks. Body weight was determined 3 times per week. Animals were sacrifced at 12 weeks. The samples were thymus (T) for histology and T cells analyses, small intestinal fluid (IF) for cytokines determination (IL-6, IFNγ and IL-10), large intestine for microbiota studies. Cytokines were also determined in the supernatant of Thymus, peritoneal Macrophages (PM) and spleen (SM) cultures treated with whole bacteria (B) or its cell wall (W). Results: OP reached peak body weight at week 9 and decreased at week 10 reaching to NC values and was maintained until end of the study. In relation body weight/thymus OC showed signifcantly higher values, probiotic supplementation decreases this relation. OC showed enterobacteria and total anaerobes population increased, and lactobacilli decreased. Higher values of lactobacilli were showed in OP. The immune cells in thymus, CD8+ and CD4+/CD8+ population in OL increased signifcantly (p