New bacteria makes inflammation glow green

It is estimated that more than 7 million people in the U.S. and Europe will be diagnosed with inflammatory bowel disease by 2030.

That digestive disease triggers abdominal pain, diarrhea and anemia.

Now, lab research is focused on swallowing a bacterial biosensor that will pinpoint and transmit inflammation information in order to treat it more effectively.

“These are genes that have evolved inside of bacteria that sense molecules in the gut that are linked to inflammation,” said Jeffrey Tabor, professor of bioengineering at Rice University.

Rice University researchers plan to use a platform delivery system to insert into the bacteria. A capsule will deliver biosensors that monitor inflammation in the gut and transmit it to physicians for diagnosis of IBD. It is non-invasive and will transmit signals back to doctors regarding the patient’s level of inflammation.

“It took us about two years to find the first bacterial sensor. We were searching in bacterial genomes, analyzing their genes, discovering sensors of inflammation biomarkers, and then putting them back in bacteria and back in animals. You can think of a bacteria as a little sphere,” Tabor said.

The bacteria in the capsule have a little antenna outside the sphere that detects the molecule in the intestines.

“The molecule will, kind of, float into the antenna, stick to it and turn the antenna on, and what this does is transmit the signal across the bacterial membrane, across the sphere, inside the bacteria itself,” Tabor said.

The bacterial sensors are connected to a green fluorescent protein, and the bacteria will glow green, pinpointing the IBD inflammation. The biosensors are retrieved from the stool.

“We shine a blue light on them, and if they glow green, we know that they’ve seen inflammation,” Tabor said.

Human clinical trials are three years out, but researchers who understand gut bacteria is the key to a cure will use it to diagnose, eventually reducing the use of invasive tools like endoscopies and colonoscopies.