Our knowledge of the role of the intestinal microbiome in health and diseases has improved in the last few decades. There is a growing body of evidence about the direct or indirect microbial effects on the human body, far from the intestinal barrier’s boundaries. The connection of the gut with the whole host body is controlled by the interaction of epithelium, immune system, and microbiome, composing the intestinal barrier. Indeed, the intestinal barrier seems to be key to explaining the homeostasis balance in eubiotic situations, and the pathogenetic mechanisms in dysbiotic situations.
The first evidence of the effects of gut microbiome and behavior was proposed in an animal model in the beginning of the 2000s. In the gut-brain axis, there is a bidirectional communication system connecting the brain to the gut, with important outcomes such as brain development, stress sensitivity, and behaviors. The disruption of the intestinal barrier leads to increased gut permeability, with altered microbiome structure and increased absorption of gut microbiome metabolites into the systemic circulation and the immune system, which influences the brain via signaling, inflammation, and neurological effects. Understanding the role of gut microbiome and their correlation with the central nervous system provides therapeutic strategies to restore gut microbiome eubiosis and to establish new probiotic medications as treatment for neuronal disorders.
Omics covers multi-disciplinary fields including genomics, epigenomics, transcriptomics, proteomics, microbiomics, and metabolomics, each of which offers the opportunity to understand the different levels of biology from a global perspective. Using high-throughput methodologies, omics research can rapidly generate large amounts of data to understand the underlying mechanisms and identify biomarkers for disease diagnosis and prognosis.
Omics studies have been used to identify the molecular relationships between the microbiome, neurotransmitters, and the gut-brain axis, which also examined links between the gut microbiome, behavior, and neurological diseases. Using different analytical platforms, multi-omics approaches have extra potential to provide a deeper understanding of gut-brain axis diseases.
For this Article Collection, the goal is to solicit submission of any articles to showcase omics analysis in the gut-brain axis related development, pathogenesis, diagnosis, and treatment, including laboratory investigations, clinical trials, and literature reviews into the subtopics highlighted below:
- Omics studies of the gut microbiome and gut-brain communication
- Omics studies to understand how environmental factors, including nutrition or host metabolism, influence the gut-brain axis
- Omics studies to understand the role of the gut-brain axis in appetite, obesity, cardiovascular disease and diabetes
- Omics studies on the relationship between the gut-brain axis and immune system
- Omics studies on the relationship between stress and gastrointestinal function.
- Omics studies to understand the role of gut microbiome in behavior and brain function, including neuroinflammation, neurodevelopmental disorders, neurodegenerative diseases and psychiatric disorders.
- Omics studies to identify new biomarkers or potential therapeutic targets of gut-brain axis disorders
Annals of Medicine accepts the following types of articles:
- Research Articles
- Review Articles
- Clinical Trials
- Protocols
- Case Series
- Commentaries
- Letter To The Editor
When submitting your article, please select the section, ‘Medical Genetics & Genomics’, and the Special Issue, ‘Omics Studies in the Gut-Brain Axis’ from the drop-down menu on the submission system.
Annals of Medicine is an online, open access, international journal publishing across all areas of medicine and is part of our Elevate Series. This means that you will receive a concierge-level publishing experience, including dedicated support from our expert in-house Editorial team, with guaranteed response times of within 48 hours, an initial decision on whether your article will be peer reviewed within 5 working days, and a first decision on your research within an average of 22 working days.
