Skip to main content

Thank you for visiting nature.com. You are using a browser version with limited support for CSS. To obtain the best experience, we recommend you use a more up to date browser (or turn off compatibility mode in Internet Explorer). In the meantime, to ensure continued support, we are displaying the site without styles and JavaScript.

Drugging the gut microbiome

Nature Biotechnology volume 33, pages 228–231 (2015)Cite this article

Subjects

An Erratum to this article was published on 09 May 2017

This article has been updated

Using conventional drug discovery and novel synthetic biology approaches, some investigators and companies are mining our resident microbes and their metabolites for targets in small-molecule drug programs. Ken Garber reports.

In January, Janssen Biotech, a Johnson & Johnson company, announced that it would license a gut microbe cocktail developed by Boston-based Vedanta Biosciences, for treating intestinal bowel disease (IBD). The deal, potentially worth $241 million to Vedanta, is the largest yet announced in the microbiome space. But Janssen is also developing gut microbiota–derived therapies on its own—not whole organisms, but small molecules. “Drug development could have many different flavors,” says Scott Plevy, a Janssen vice president and its IBD group leader. “It might be, if we're lucky, that an active metabolite or even a gene product of a microbe could be a drug in and of itself.” Janssen is also identifying targets for its own novel compounds. “Through characterization of host receptors that interact with these metabolites, we could make a small molecule to these host receptors,” Plevy says. “We've been studying several.”

This is a preview of subscription content, access via your institution

Relevant articles

Open Access articles citing this article.

Access options

Rent or buy this article

Prices vary by article type

from$1.95

to$39.95

Learn more

Prices may be subject to local taxes which are calculated during checkout

Figure 1: The metabolites produced by gut bacterial fermentation of dietary fiber induce Tregs and dampen inflammation.

Change history

  • 12 October 2016

    In the version of this article initially published, on p.231, left-hand column, the maker of linaclotide was said to be Redwood rather than Ironwood Pharmaceuticals. In addition, linaclotide is no longer referred to as a “homolog of the enterotoxin peptides,” but as “similar to the enterotoxin peptides,” and it has been clarified to be “rationally designed.” The errors have been corrected in the HTML and PDF versions of the article.

References

  1. Wang, Z. et al. Nature 472, 57–63 (2011).

    Article  CAS  Google Scholar 

  2. van Nood, E. et al. N. Engl. J. Med. 368, 407–415 (2013).

    Article  CAS  Google Scholar 

  3. Hsiao, E.Y. et al. Cell 155, 1451–1463 (2013).

    Article  CAS  Google Scholar 

  4. Mazmanian, S.K. et al. Cell 122, 107–118 (2005).

    Article  CAS  Google Scholar 

  5. Atarashi, K. et al. Nature 500, 232–236 (2013).

    Article  CAS  Google Scholar 

  6. Trompette, A. et al. Nat. Med. 20, 159–166 (2014).

    Article  CAS  Google Scholar 

  7. Chang, P.V. et al. Proc. Natl. Acad. Sci. USA 111, 2247–2252 (2014).

    Article  CAS  Google Scholar 

  8. Yoshimoto, S. et al. Nature 499, 97–101 (2013).

    Article  CAS  Google Scholar 

  9. Donia, M.S. et al. Cell 158, 1402–1414 (2014).

    Article  CAS  Google Scholar 

Download references

Author information

Authors and Affiliations

  1. Ann Arbor, Michigan

    Ken Garber

Authors
  1. Ken Garber
    View author publications

    You can also search for this author in PubMed Google Scholar

Rights and permissions

Reprints and Permissions

About this article

Check for updates. Verify currency and authenticity via CrossMark

Cite this article

Garber, K. Drugging the gut microbiome. Nat Biotechnol 33, 228–231 (2015). https://doi.org/10.1038/nbt.3161

Download citation

  • Published:

  • Issue Date:

  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1038/nbt.3161

This article is cited by

Search

Advanced search

Quick links

Nature Briefing: Translational Research

Sign up for the Nature Briefing: Translational Research newsletter — top stories in biotechnology, drug discovery and pharma.

Get what matters in translational research, free to your inbox weekly. Sign up for Nature Briefing: Translational Research