TRYPinGUT - O triptofano no eixo cérebro-intestino – o combate à inflamação intestinal usando uma estratégia nutricional versátil

Tryptophan metabolic pathways suggest a potential immunomodulatory role. This immunomodulatory role might be direct (via metabolism in gut immune cells) and/or indirectly (via metabolism in gut serotonin-producing cells and gut microbiota). Based on this hypothesis, TRYPinGUT aims at i) uncover the complex dynamics of RT diet-induced enteritis; ii) determining the extension of enteritis to the brain-gut axis; iii) assessing the modulatory effect of tryptophan supplementation on enteritis and on the brain-gut axis. Aquafeeds represent the biggest costs in fish farming and the optimization of feeds formulation is key for a sustainable and efficient production process. Significant efforts have been made so far regarding fish meal/fish oil replacement by more sustainable ingredients. These raw materials were firstly largely replaced by alternative, vegetable sources. Currently, there is a wide and diverse offer of alternative ingredients with different sources, from animal (poultry, insects, swine) to vegetable (soybean, sunflower, wheat, etc.). Unfortunately, gut inflammation has often been identified in studies concerning different fish species and new, raw materials, but to the extent of our knowledge, very few counteractive strategies have been proposed so far. TRYPinGut provides a holistic approach to a neglected but significant health issue in aquaculture nutrition: diet induced enteritis. It is an ambitious proposal that intends to offer a solution: a new functional ingredient that has the potential to downregulate gut inflammatory response to new, alternative ingredients, without impacting aquafeeds new formulations, hence, without hampering the advances in aquaculture sustainability. The proposed objectives are also ambitious as they not only focus on the specific role of tryptophan in gut inflammation. Because TRYPinGut intends to explore several routes of modulation, it also offers to make a general screening of enteritis broader implications. The brain-gut axis has been thoroughly investigated in mammalian models and an individual’s enteric microbial community is frequently referred to as an additional organ, given its functional importance to the host. In fish, such interactions – brain-gut-intestinal flora – have received little to no attention. One of the objectives of TRYPinGut is to explore the implications of an ongoing intestinal inflammatory process on the microorganisms living there and on the communication pathways extending to the central nervous system. It is also ambitious due to its multidisciplinary character, both technically-wise (histology, humoral analyses, transcriptomics, proteomics, microbiome analyses, metabolites quantification) and regarding fish responses, too (local, systemic, brain-gut axis involvement). Given this multidisciplinarity and in-depth character of the proposed analytical techniques, data generated during the course of the activities, will certainly disclose interesting physiological properties of tryptophan, beyond those already reported, opening a wide range of new possible applications.