Abstract
Majority of body compartments, especially the gut, skin, respiratory and genitourinary tracts, is normally inhabited by highly complex microbial populations designated as microbiota. Gut microbiota is the best studied so far.
Colonisation patterns of gut microbiota which are acquired early during ontogeny, especially during the infant's age, are normally maintained for life. Both mucosal and systemic immunity, which are highly individualized, are determined by physiological gut microbiota.
Dysbiosis which is disturbed gut microbiota is followed by extensive negative impacts on human physiology. Recently, substantial links between gut microbiota and CNS were found.
Whereas physiological colonisation patterns are supporting optimal development of brain structures by providing them with some energy and homeostatic regulations on inflammatory processes, dysbiotic microbiota results in abnormal functional polarisation of T cell subsets. The result is the initiation and the progression of a harmful inflammatory response which might be a part of the pathophysiological processes leading to the development of MS.
Gut microbiota could be positively modulated via optimal nutrition rich in prebiotic oligosaccharides, probiotics, and postbiotics. The optimalisation of nutrition can influence harmful inflammation in MS patients as evidenced in some animal models.
Clinical trials to evaluate the efficacy of fecal microbiota transplantation in MS patients can be expected in the near future.