
The inhalation of a mixture of living Lactobacilli bacteria helped reduce pulmonary inflammation and improved lung function in models of mice with bronchopulmonary dysplasia (BPD) and COPD. That’s according to a study published in Nature Communications that examined the mechanism of a live biotherapeutic (LBP) product — a powder mixture of active Lactobacillus strains — to reduce neutrophilic inflammation and a large number of inflammatory markers.Vivek Lal, MDUAB
Charitath Vivek Lal, MD, a neonatologist at the University of Alabama Birmingham (UAB) and co-leader of the research, said in a news release that the findings “provide a paradigm for the progression of structural lung disease,” because they identified the Lactobacilli as critical to regulating lung protease activity that is linked to the destruction caused by matrikine generation, extracellular matrix turnover and chronic neutrophilic inflammation that damages air sacs in the lungs.
Dr. Lal and his UAB colleagues began researching the role of Lactobacilli as a possible treatment for lung disease in 2016, when they discovered that the airways of infants with severe BPD had decreased numbers of the bacteria, coupled with increased numbers of proteobacteria and increased concentrations of proteobacterial endotoxin.
“Inhaled live biotherapeutic products show promise in addressing common pathways of disease progression that in the future can be targeted at a variety of lung disease,” Dr. Lal said. “Preclinical animal data is suggestive, and safety of the potential drug in humans will be tested in a forthcoming clinical trial. Human adult safety data in COPD will help de-risk the pathway to approval for use of the drug in BPD infants.”
The researchers used particle engineering to create the inhaled Lactobacillus powder, which contained particles small enough to reach deep into the lungs while preserving viable bacteria. This product was then tested in both BPD and COPD models. In the COPD models, it successfully reduced inflammation in the lung microenvironment showing anti-inflammatory effects and the decrease of several pro-inflammatory markers.