A Process Systems Engineering study on the human gut microbiota metabolic functions

Human gut microbiota has been widely studied the last decades. There is an increasing number of scientists that strongly support the belief that human health is related not only to our own genome, but also to the living microbes of our body. Apart from that, gut microbiota is also crucial in processing exogenous compounds, such as medicines, intended to rectify homeostatic imbalances. Most specifically, drug pharmacokinetics can be altered by microbiome-encoded enzymes, which enhance clinical responses. The current study is focused on the quantitative investigation of the intestinal microbiota metabolic functions in the human gastrointestinal tract. The digestion process will be implemented by means of a bioreactor set-up that will account for both the physicochemical and microbial conditions in the digestion system. In addition, mathematical models will be built in order to describe and predict the growth and metabolism of the gut microbiota community.