Probiotics, the era of medicine

In Chile, feminine genital tract infections are highly prevalent, especially bacterial vaginosis, a disorder that close to half the female population suffers and one that has strong repercussions in their reproductive and mental health.

Numerous studies have verified the relation between these diseases and the depopulation of Lactobacillus spp. in the vaginal ecosystem. This microorganism protects the vaginal ecosystem from the invasion of pathogens.

The deterioration in the quality of life of the female population (and the society in general), the raised economic cost that these place on the private and public sector, and the strong epidemiological impact motivated the execution of the Fondef project Biotechnological development and applications for the elaboration of a vaginal probiotic: a alternative for the prevention and treatment of female genital tract infections, which seeks to improve the quality of life for women by improvements in their reproductive health.

For this, a pharmaceutical product based in probiotic organisms will be designed to restore the vaginal microorganisms and prevent infection. The principal scientific– technological impact will be the development of an experimental biotechnological application model, transferable to other disciplines for medicine as well as agriculture, animal raising, and food sectors.

The initiative proposes to prevent the depopulation of the vaginal organisms through a preparation with lactobacilli that possess beneficial properties such as the production of hydrogen peroxide and/or the capacity to adhere to the cells of this anatomical site, which favors the repopulation of these beneficial bacteria.

The idea is to isolate and characterize the best lactobacilli, which will later be provided for public use in a pharmaceutical support.

The project will use a bioreactor, a fermenting machine in which the bacteria are cultivated, increasing their performance and properties. An innovative aspect is that semi-permeable membranes will be incorporated to increase lactobacilli concentration and permits the
replacement of expensive standard culture medium with other less-expensive ones.

Once the production of lactobacilli is optimized, concentration studies of the product will be carried out to later dehydrate it while maintaining its beneficial properties. This process is directly related with pharmaceutical support and with its useful life, and consequently its quality needs to be assured.

Presently, the research team has selected 10 lactobacilli with both probiotic and biotechnological properties, and with which they will begin to design the pharmaceutical presentations.

Better production and more quality

The lactobacilli are not only beneficial for humans, but for all living beings in general. Their properties, optimized by biotechnological processes, could also protect other species like salmonoids.

With the identification of the sources of Lactobacillus spp. in the gastrointestinal tract of the rainbow trout, a technological business venture sketched during the Fondef project began to appear. Indeed, the impact of the discovery and projections in the national aquiculture industry that Bio Bio region’s Technological Innovation Fund Innova Bío Bío, decided to finance the proposal Biotechnological Applications for the design of probiotics that favor biological control in aquiculture.

The initiative seeks to provide the conditions for clean production and biological control of aquiculture in the Bio Bio region through the development of probiotic products that prevent infections in salmonoids, increasing in this way their productivity and competitiveness in national and international markets.

Chile has experimented an explosive growth in the production of salmon and trout in the 1990s. Actually, more than 300 thousand tons of salmonoids are produced nationally and the production should be tripled in 2010, challenging the industry, especially in the area of environmentally sustainable production, not only for the
necessity to satisfy the environmental norms, but in evident savings that investing in technologies that make more efficient the utilization of food and less use of antibiotics and disinfectants.

This probiotic will permit the cultivation of more health fish, diminishing the treatments costs of sickness and the contamination produced by the substance for their control. Its reach is immense, since international tendencies are targeted towards clean production processes that reduce the residue and emission generation, utilize more adequately the available resources and improve production
quality.