Artificial cellulose derivatives are metabolized by select human gut Bacteroidota upon priming with common plant β-glucans
Bibliographic record
Abstract
ABSTRACT Synthetic ethers of cellulose (β(1,4)-glucan) are widely used in the food and pharmaceutical industry as thickeners, gelling agents, emulsifiers, and stabilizers. Consequently, humans ingest significant amounts of artificial cellulose derivatives in diets containing processed foods and through oral drug formulations. In the present study, we examined the potential of mixed-linkage β-glucan (MLG) and xyloglucan (XyG) polysaccharide utilization loci of autochthonous human gut (gastrointestinal tract) Bacteroidota to enable metabolism of artificial cellulose derivatives, based on the commonality of their backbone linkages. Two representative Bacteroides and six representative Segatella (syn. Prevotella ) strains all failed to grow on carboxymethyl cellulose (CMC, E466), methyl cellulose (MC, E461), hydroxypropyl methyl cellulose (HPMC, E464), and hydroxyethyl cellulose (HEC) as sole carbohydrate sources. However, remarkably, collateral metabolism of cellulose ethers was observed when bacteria were primed with low levels of cereal MLG or dicot XyG, in a species-dependent, strain-dependent, and polysaccharide-dependent manner. Using the type strain Segatella copri DSM18205 as an example, cellulose derivative utilization was rationalized by demonstrating that outer membrane-localized endo -glucanases were both transcriptionally upregulated and possessed side activities toward CMC, MC, HPMC, and/or HEC. On one hand, our results in vitro counter the conventional wisdom that soluble cellulose derivatives are non-metabolizable in the human gut. On the other hand, our study suggests that broader analysis of this underappreciated metabolic ability is warranted in a wider range of taxa, especially in consideration of potential physiological effects in the context of balanced diets comprising plant polysaccharides. IMPORTANCE Our data reveal a previously unknown potential among members of the human gut microbiota to metabolize artificial cellulose derivatives used in processed food and oral pharmaceuticals, which is driven by plant glycans ubiquitous in well-balanced diets containing natural dietary fiber. These results challenge the conventional wisdom that cellulose ethers are not broken down and metabolized in monogastric animals and motivate broader exploration of this phenomenon across the numerous autochthonous taxa.
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How this classification was reachedexpand
Full frame machine prediction
Teacher imitationNot calibrated prevalence, not ground truth. Human validation pending. The Gemma side is a direct model label for every work in the frame, read from the title-only record. The Codex side is a classifier learned from the 10,348 direct Codex labels and calibrated to design-weighted sample rates; fields without enough sample support carry no Codex call. Candidate is the union of the two sides; consensus is their intersection. These outputs are machine_predicted_unvalidated and are not human labels.
Distilled classifier scores by category (both heads)
| Category | Codex | Gemma |
|---|---|---|
| Metaresearch | 0.000 | 0.000 |
| Meta-epidemiology (narrow) | 0.000 | 0.000 |
| Meta-epidemiology (broad) | 0.000 | 0.000 |
| Bibliometrics | 0.000 | 0.000 |
| Science and technology studies | 0.000 | 0.000 |
| Scholarly communication | 0.000 | 0.000 |
| Open science | 0.000 | 0.000 |
| Research integrity | 0.000 | 0.000 |
| Insufficient payload (model declined to judge) | 0.001 | 0.000 |
Machine scores (provisional)
The two teacher heads of the student model, read on this work. A score orders the frame for review; it never asserts a category, and the validation status ships verbatim with every row.
Baseline scores from an immature model (maturity gate not passed, 7 training rounds). Scores rank; they never assert a category.
score_only:v0-immature-baseline · verbatim from the scoring run: score_only means the number may rank works, and no category label ships from itClassification
machine, unvalidatedMachine predicted; a candidate call from one source (direct Gemma or distilled Codex), not a consensus.
How this classification was reached, model by model and score by score, is at the end of the page under "How this classification was reached".