Determining how the microbiota and dietary selenium influence the function of long-lived intestinal macrophages to promote gut health

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Changes to environmental factors such as microbial colonisation and dietary nutrition, brought about by modern lifestyles, are having significant impacts on human health. Some of these changes are having negative impacts on the quality of life we experience and limit our health and wellbeing. Our gut is an extremely important organ in our bodies that allows us to extract the nutrients and water from the food we eat. As well as food, it is in close contact with the large community of good bacteria that live inside us. It also provides a route of entry into our bodies for harmful bacteria. This variety of stimuli entering our bodies through our gut represents a challenge for our bodies, which need to maintain a constant environment necessary for the gut to do it's job. Disruption of this carefully balanced environment can lead to illnesses such as inflammation, food intolerance and cancer. I have recently described an immune cell in the gut that is present from birth and stays with us over the course of our lifetime. Initial results suggest that this population could help to maintain a healthy gut. My research aims are to discover how these gut immune cells maintain a healthy gut and whether we can boost their function using bacteria and food nutrients.