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PBM can change the diversity of the intestinal microbiome

03.03.2019

An animal study shows that PBM is able to change the intestinal microbiome positively and to significantly increase the number of bacteria that stand for a healthy intestinal environment.

The animal study was published by Brian Bicknell, Ann Liebert, Daniel Johnstone and Horses Kiat in the journal Lasers in Medical Science (Springer Verlag) in August 2018 (Lasers in Medical Science https://doi.org/10.1007/s10103-018-2594-6). The following text was slightly modified after the study abstract.

Photobiomodulation of the microbiome: implications for metabolic and inflammatory diseases.

The human microbiome is closely associated with Health and plays a role in obesity, metabolic disorders such as type II diabetes and various diseases such as cardiovascular and neurodegenerative diseases. The intestinal milieu can be altered by diet, probiotics and faecal transplantation. A change has flow-on effects on health. PBM has therapeutic effects on inflammation and neurological diseases and may also affect metabolic disorders and obesity.
 

The aim of this study was to investigate whether PBM can affect the microbioma of mice. The abdomen of the mice was irradiated with red and infrared low-energy laser light (several times or only once) over a period of 2 weeks. The genome DNA extracted from faeces pellets was then pyrosequenced for the 16rRNA gene. The result showed a significant difference in the diversity of the intestinal microenvironment between the PBM-treated group and the sham-treated mice. In particular, one bacterial species (allobaculum) was elevated when irradiated with infrared laser light. Allobaculum is an indicator bacterium associated with a healthy microbiome. If these results are confirmed in humans, it is possible that PBM can be used as an additional therapy to treat obesity and other lifestyle-related diseases as well as cardiovascular and neurodegenerative diseases.

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