Modulation of the diet and gastrointestinal microbiota normalizes systemic inflammation and -cell chemokine expression associated with autoimmune diabetes susceptibility

The incidence of Type 1 diabetes (T1D), a T-cell mediated autoimmunity that targets the insulin secreting -cells, has significantly increased, suggesting greater environmental pressure. In studies of T1D families and the BioBreeding rat model, we have identified a peripheral innate inflammatory state that is associated with diabetes susceptibility, consistent with pattern recognition receptor (PRR) ligation, but independent of disease progression. Here, compared to control strains, islets of spontaneously diabetic BB DRlyp/lyp and nondiatetic BB DR+/+ weanlings provided a standard cereal diet were found to temporally express a proinflammatory transcriptional program consistent with microbial antigen exposure that included numerous cytokines/chemokines. Dependence of this proinflammatory phenotype on the diet and gastrointestinal microbiota was investigated by transitioning DR+/+ weanlings to a hydrolyzed casein diet (HCD) or treating them with antibiotics to respectively alter or reduce PRR ligand exposure.

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Henschel AM, Cabrera SM, Kaldunski ML, Jia S, Geoffrey R, Roethle MF, Lam V, Chen YG, Wang X, Salzman NH, Hessner MJ