TY - JOUR T1 - A Mediterranean-like fat blend protects against the development of severe colitis in the mucin-2 deficient murine model JF - bioRxiv DO - 10.1101/2021.09.27.462042 SP - 2021.09.27.462042 AU - Natasha Haskey AU - Jiayu Ye AU - Mehrbod Estaki AU - Andrea A. Verdugo Meza AU - Jacqueline A. Barnett AU - Mitra Yousefi AU - Blake W. Birnie AU - Samantha Gruenheid AU - Sanjoy Ghosh AU - Deanna L. Gibson Y1 - 2021/01/01 UR - http://biorxiv.org/content/early/2021/10/17/2021.09.27.462042.abstract N2 - The Mediterranean diet (MD) is a health-promoting, moderate fat diet (~ 40% energy). It is not known if the blend of fats found in the MD contribute to the beneficial protective effects. We compared the MD fat blend (high monounsaturated, 2:1 n-6:n-3 polyunsaturated and moderate saturated fat) to isocaloric diets composed with corn oil (CO, n-6 polyunsaturated-rich), olive oil (high monounsaturated-rich) or milk fat (MF, saturated-rich) on spontaneous colitis development in Muc2−/− mice. The MD resulted in lower clinical and histopathological scores, and induced tolerogenic CD103+CD11b+ dendritic, Th22 and IL-17+IL-22+ cells important for intestinal barrier repair. MD also reduced attendant insulin resistance and a shift to a higher health-promoting gut microbes including Lactobacillus B. animalis and Muribaculaceae, whereas CO showed higher prevalence of mucin-degraders (Akkermansia muciniphila) and colitis promoters (Enterobacteriaceae). Our findings suggest that the MD fat blend could be recommended as a maintenance diet for colitis.Competing Interest StatementThe authors have declared no competing interest. ER -