Max Nieuwdorp’s innovative research on gut microbes: a path to combat fatty liver disease

Internist Max Nieuwdorp, of Amsterdam UMC, discovered a few years ago that the microorganisms in the intestines of many overweight people produce alcohol to an increased extent. Excessive alcohol leads to fatty liver disease, which in turn poses a risk of serious conditions such as diabetes and cardiovascular disease. Nieuwdorp has now received an ERC Advanced Grant of 2.5 million euros for a major study into the underlying causes of this excessive alcohol production.

Almost 1 in 5 adults in the Netherlands is overweight, and more than 80 percent of them have fatty liver disease. Max Nieuwdorp suspects that the high sugar content in modern diets contributes to increased alcohol production in the intestines. He hopes that discovering the link between a disrupted microbiome and increased alcohol production will pave the way for new treatments for fatty liver disease and liver inflammation.  

Major study into gut bacteria 

With the ERC Advanced Grant funding, Nieuwdorp aims to investigate whether it is possible to control alcohol production in the intestines by modifying intestinal bacteria to break down more alcohol. Now, he will delve deeper into this research by analyzing the medical data and eating patterns of participants in the long-term HELIUS study. 

Support by IXA 

The invention that a specific bacterium can convert alcohol into beneficial short-chain fatty acids, made by Max Nieuwdorp’s research group at Amsterdam UMC, was patented and a license agreement with Amsterdam UMC spin-off company Advanced Microbiome Interventions (AMI) was concluded by IXA Amsterdam UMC.