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Could the bacteria in our gut help treat cancer?

by Gabriella Beer | Analysis

21 March 2019

9 comments 9 comments

An image of the lining of our gut, which is home to a variety of species of bacteria.

“The microbiome is a huge part of who we are,” says Dr Marios Giannakis.

“We have more microbes in our bodies than human cells and yet we still don’t fully understand the role they play in health and disease.”

The microbiome is a collection of trillions of microorganisms, spanning bacteria, fungi and viruses, that call the human body home.

Giannakis, a doctor and researcher at the Dana Farber Cancer Institute in Boston in the US, is among those pondering how these microbes might be tied to bowel cancer.

This is because a large proportion of our microbiome is found in the gut, with research suggesting that these vibrant communities might be helping some cancers develop. That’s why Giannakis, and a team of 12 other international experts, have been given up to £20 million from Cancer Research UK’s Grand Challenge scheme to find out more.

Gut bacteria can protect us

Bacteria make up most of the gut microbiome and are the major focus of research linking it to cancer. Professor Emma Allen-Vercoe, a world-leading microbiologist from the University of Guelph in Canada, has spent her career studying these organisms, with her early work contributing to the first hints that bacteria might be involved in bowel diseases, including cancer.

The immediate reaction people have when they’re told that they have tiny microbes in their gut is that they cause disease… But they’re actually really protective.

– Professor Emma Allen-Vercoe, University of Guelph

“The immediate reaction people have when they’re told that they have tiny microbes in their gut is that they cause disease and that they need to be got rid of,” says Allen-Vercoe, now part of the Grand Challenge team. “But they’re actually really protective.”

The types of bacteria that protect us from harm and how they do this is, however, uncertain. “It isn’t as simple as getting an infection and becoming sick,” she says, adding that it’s not necessarily just a case of having a balance of ‘good’ and ‘bad’ bacteria either.

“It’s more about how the body and other microbes interact with and control ‘bad bacteria’ to neutralise them.”

If that isn’t complicated enough, researchers are also working against a backdrop of everyone’s microbiome being different.

“This makes it incredibly hard to find patterns, unless you look at enormous numbers or patients,” says Allen-Vercoe.

Until now, there simply hasn’t been the means to explore the microbiome and its relation to cancer in the epic detail it needs.

“We’ve all been working on this problem in our individual labs and hospitals,” says Giannakis. “We’ve been studying the behaviour of bacteria and looking at the microbiomes in people who have cancer. It’s thanks to the British public funding these efforts that we can bring all these individual pieces together under an umbrella of collaboration.”

A worldwide partnership

The newly funded team, led by Professors Matthew Meyerson and Wendy Garrett, is as impressive as the challenge they’re embarking on. They’ll be working on lots of different projects, from reading the DNA of gut bacteria from thousands of people to running a clinical trial. And they’ll be doing this across borders, with scientists, doctors, and patients from the United States, Canada and Europe sharing ideas, samples and most importantly, results.

Take Allen-Vercoe’s lab, just an hour and a half drive from Niagara Falls. Her team will study microbes such as those found in colorectal cancerpatients, treated in Boston, and grow them in an artificial bowel they’ve dubbed the ‘robo gut’.

“It turns out you can’t grow microbes from the gut very easily in the lab, so we needed another way to study them,” says Allen-Vercoe.

The robo gut mimics nature using a special tank called a bioreactor. “We’ve created a bunch of bioreactor vessels that allows the whole microbiome from a person’s gut to be grown in the lab.”

But bacteria also interact closely with healthy bowel cells and the immune system, so to replicate human conditions these components are needed too. Professor Hans Clevers, from the Hubrecht Institute in the Netherlands and another Grand Challenge team member, is a world-leader in growing miniaturised human organs in the lab. These ‘organoids’ are essentially balls of gut cells that adopt the shape and form you’d expect to see in the human bowel but grown in the lab.

Thanks to Grand Challenge, Clevers’ organoids will be flown from the Netherlands over to Canada.

What do we already know about the microbiome and cancer?

Allen-Vercoe says they’re venturing into “an unknown frontier”. But over the past couple of decades, clues from both the lab and the clinic suggest the microbiome is important to study. And one particular bacterium is thought to play a prominent role.

Fusobacterium is found in and around one third of bowel cancers,” says Allen-Vercoe. This link is too strong to be coincidence. And research points to lifestyle as potentially playing a role, with large studies showing that Fusobacteriaare more likely to be found in those who eat certain foods.

“People who consume inflammatory diets have a higher risk of Fusobacterium-associated bowel cancer,” says Giannakis.

“This bacterium is also more frequently present in cancers of the right side of the colon and patients with Fusobacterium-positive tumours often have a worse outcome.”

This suggests bacteria in the gut could help cancer develop and progress, but what can we do about it? Well, there’s also evidence to suggest that tinkering with the microbiome in people is possible.

“In a different study, we gave people with a C. difficile infection an ecosystem of ‘good’ bacteria in a capsule,” says Allen-Vercoe, who’s spin-off company designs therapies that change the composition of bacteria in a person’s gut.

Coincidently, two patients in this study had lots of Fusobacteriumin their microbiome, which dropped after treatment. “This has given us hope that applying a microbiome drug could remove some of the ‘bad’ bacteria in people with bowel cancer,” she says.

It’s time to understand these organisms’ lives

“This Challenge is trying to answer a really big question that we’ve been trying to answer for nearly 10 years,” says Allen-Vercoe. “We’ve been struggling to do that mainly because these are such difficult microbes to grow and manage.”

But now technology has offered a solution. “Thanks to advances in the robo guts and organoids we can explore the microbiome in ways we couldn’t possibly do before.”

Scientists at Dana Faber are also working on developing new drugs that might be able to destroy individual ‘bad’ bacteria. And the library of clinical samples has been steadily growing.

“We are planning to collect thousands of specimens as part of a large study.” says Giannakis. This could provide enough tumour and microbiome samples to hunt for patterns.

A final, intriguing complication in understanding the gut microbiome is that it varies between nations. Luckily, a previous Grand Challenge project has collected tumour samples from around the world, offering precious insight into the different microbiomes.

“Collaborating with Sir Mike Stratton’s team and studying their samples means we can and look at tumours across the globe and really grasp how the microbiome changes with lifestyles and geographic location,” says Giannakis.

How long until patients benefit?

The team don’t expect to find all the answers in the next couple of years. This is big science, they know they’re in for the long haul.

“Clearly certain parts of the proposal will have more immediate impact on patients than others,” says Giannakis. He suspects some of the first people to benefit might be his patients taking the living ecosystems made by Allen-Vercoe.

“Patients who have recently had surgery to remove their colon cancers will get an ecosystem with about 40 different bacterial species in them,” Allen-Vercoe says. The hope is these ‘good’ microbes will settle and displace the ‘bad guys’, and stop the cancer coming back.

“It’s obviously an ambitious proposal,” says Giannakis. “We have to be prepared for our findings taking us in unexpected directions.”

But both are eager to get going.

“I’ve been studying these bacteria for years. Now we have the right team together to really get some answers,” says Allen-Vercoe.

Gabi

    Comments

  • Colin Ferrett
    22 April 2019

    Your video of the gut is interesting but you have missed one important and salient detail. The mucocelluar layer ! It is this mucus environment that protects and maintains a barrier from the luminal microbiome. This layer contains a unique taxa of bacteria not found in faecal matter. This is where the answers lie !

  • Patricia Beaumont
    17 April 2019

    Re your bowel cancer research I have had Crohn’s disease for many years and for the last 4 months have been taking a Probiotic suggested by Crohn’ s and Colitis Assoc consisting of bifidobacterium lactis and lactobacillus paracasai .It has got rid of 25 years of misery with with diarrrhea my bowels are back to normal and there are no side effects so I wish you very good luck with your research it might be the way to go

  • Annie Byles
    9 April 2019

    I’m 76 years old and not sure how I got to this age without any major blips in my life except for a nasty case of shingles in my ear 2 years ago
    I’m a great believer in giving my body time to heal itself especially with a virus & teslusevthat not all microbes or bugs are bad
    Carry on with the great work you do
    I love learning especially with dance
    Lost my first husband to bowel cancer in 1970
    & my eldest grandson has had testicular cancer . In his 4th year free of it
    It’s touched many of my friends too some who’ve lost the fight
    Thank you for all you do ❤️

  • Maureen
    8 April 2019

    We should be educating people about their diets, clinical studies have proven that eating foods from animal products is contributory to cancer, heart disease, diabetes, and obesity.

  • Barbara Stafford
    7 April 2019

    You refer to diet as being a contributor to bowel cancer. Apart from the now well known guidance, do you have any new or extra advice ? Thank you for this marvellous newsletter, Barbara Stafford

  • reply
    Gabriella Beer
    16 April 2019

    Hi Barbara,
    Thanks for your question. There’s good evidence that what we eat and drink can increase the risk of bowel cancer, such as eating too much processed and red meat, drinking alcohol and not eating enough foods high in fibre.
    A balanced diet also plays an important role in keeping a healthy weight, which after not smoking is the best way to reduce cancer risk.
    All of our information about diet and cancer risk can be found here: cruk.org/diet

    Thanks,
    Karis, Cancer Research UK

  • Lynn Reveley
    6 April 2019

    Sounds amazing, we are so lucky to have these inquisitive, knowledgeable people who will find the answers and save lives. The human body is mind blowing. Good luck to all the teams.

  • Jill Davidson
    6 April 2019

    Sounds interesting. I am based in the UK and aged 46. I have already had primary colorectal cancer which metastasised to my ovaries and peritoneal cavity and I have had further surgery to remove these tumours. I am interested in how I could get access to the ecosystem with about 40 different bacterial species and whether this would help me longer term. Is this part of a clinical trial?

  • Frances Thomson
    6 April 2019

    Amazing work, research is a wonderful pains taking process that benefits the human race.
    Good luck and thank you

  • Jane Patchett
    5 April 2019

    Fantastic news. A huge challenge but with new technology to help, it sounds very positive and is certainly on the road to eradicating certain cancers.

    Comments

  • Colin Ferrett
    22 April 2019

    Your video of the gut is interesting but you have missed one important and salient detail. The mucocelluar layer ! It is this mucus environment that protects and maintains a barrier from the luminal microbiome. This layer contains a unique taxa of bacteria not found in faecal matter. This is where the answers lie !

  • Patricia Beaumont
    17 April 2019

    Re your bowel cancer research I have had Crohn’s disease for many years and for the last 4 months have been taking a Probiotic suggested by Crohn’ s and Colitis Assoc consisting of bifidobacterium lactis and lactobacillus paracasai .It has got rid of 25 years of misery with with diarrrhea my bowels are back to normal and there are no side effects so I wish you very good luck with your research it might be the way to go

  • Annie Byles
    9 April 2019

    I’m 76 years old and not sure how I got to this age without any major blips in my life except for a nasty case of shingles in my ear 2 years ago
    I’m a great believer in giving my body time to heal itself especially with a virus & teslusevthat not all microbes or bugs are bad
    Carry on with the great work you do
    I love learning especially with dance
    Lost my first husband to bowel cancer in 1970
    & my eldest grandson has had testicular cancer . In his 4th year free of it
    It’s touched many of my friends too some who’ve lost the fight
    Thank you for all you do ❤️

  • Maureen
    8 April 2019

    We should be educating people about their diets, clinical studies have proven that eating foods from animal products is contributory to cancer, heart disease, diabetes, and obesity.

  • Barbara Stafford
    7 April 2019

    You refer to diet as being a contributor to bowel cancer. Apart from the now well known guidance, do you have any new or extra advice ? Thank you for this marvellous newsletter, Barbara Stafford

  • reply
    Gabriella Beer
    16 April 2019

    Hi Barbara,
    Thanks for your question. There’s good evidence that what we eat and drink can increase the risk of bowel cancer, such as eating too much processed and red meat, drinking alcohol and not eating enough foods high in fibre.
    A balanced diet also plays an important role in keeping a healthy weight, which after not smoking is the best way to reduce cancer risk.
    All of our information about diet and cancer risk can be found here: cruk.org/diet

    Thanks,
    Karis, Cancer Research UK

  • Lynn Reveley
    6 April 2019

    Sounds amazing, we are so lucky to have these inquisitive, knowledgeable people who will find the answers and save lives. The human body is mind blowing. Good luck to all the teams.

  • Jill Davidson
    6 April 2019

    Sounds interesting. I am based in the UK and aged 46. I have already had primary colorectal cancer which metastasised to my ovaries and peritoneal cavity and I have had further surgery to remove these tumours. I am interested in how I could get access to the ecosystem with about 40 different bacterial species and whether this would help me longer term. Is this part of a clinical trial?

  • Frances Thomson
    6 April 2019

    Amazing work, research is a wonderful pains taking process that benefits the human race.
    Good luck and thank you

  • Jane Patchett
    5 April 2019

    Fantastic news. A huge challenge but with new technology to help, it sounds very positive and is certainly on the road to eradicating certain cancers.