Next-Generation Probiotics (NGPs)

Live biotherapeutics based on natural or engineered live microorganisms are a revolutionary class of medicines. They are designed and used to sense and respond to environmental signals to keep a dynamic balance between the host cells and diverse microbiota microbes, thus maintaining a healthy state. Based on our expertise in microbiota and microbiome science, Creative Biolabs is focused on providing process development & optimization and cGMP manufacturing services for next-generation probiotics (NGPs) targeting different diseases linked to the human microbiome.

Introduction of NGPs

NGPs are beneficial bacteria that may not be purely developed as traditional probiotics only as foods or dietary supplements, but also defined as organisms developed for pharmaceutical application. NGPs have been shown to target specific diseases and have therapeutic purposes like drugs. Due to the rapid development of advanced genetic sequencing tools and the bioinformatics platforms, as well as more powerful tools to edit and modify bacterial genomes, increasing interests have been devoted to the evaluation of new strains of probiotics and applicability in biomedical research.

Fig.1 Timeline of selected milestones in the history of probiotics and next-generation probiotics. (O'Toole, 2017)

Mechanism of Action of NGPs

NGPs have been shown therapeutic promise in intra- and extra-intestinal, chronic inflammation-related diseases such as colitis, obesity/metabolic syndromes, diabetes mellitus, liver diseases, cardiovascular diseases, and also cancer and neurodegenerative diseases. They may function through enhancing the integrity of the intestinal epithelial layer, increasing in optimal IgA production, modulation of homeostatic bile acids production and secretion, and increasing in the production of antimicrobial peptides.

Tab.1 Selected examples of next-generation probiotics. (O'Toole, 2017)

Mainly NGP Candidates Developed by Creative Biolabs

Aided by the next-generation sequencing and bioinformatics platforms, Creative Biolabs has developed a wide range of potential NGPs that can be applied for targeted therapy on specific inflammation or other diseases. At present, more and more NGP candidates are being isolated and characterized, some of them are selectively described below

Akkermansia muciniphlla