Food preferences, sensory and reward domains after bariatric surgery: role of gut microbiota composition and function – BARIA-gut-TASTE

Bariatric surgery (BS) is the most effective treatment to achieve durable weight loss, despite a large variability among individuals. BS has been associated with major gut brain axis modifications impacting eating behavior, food preferences and sensory perceptions. The gut microbiota (GM) is a key player into the gut-brain axis and is deeply remodeled after BS. The individual variability in changing food preferences following BS, in parallel to differential alteration of GM merits further investigation regarding the weight loss success and maintenance after BS. BARIA-gut-TASTE aims at understanding the interplay of BS-induced changes of GM and the evolution of eating behavior associated with success and maintenance of post BS-weight loss. Based on 6 workpackages, our project will combine clinical, epidemiological, and mechanistic tasks to: 1) To investigate via a prospective randomized controlled trial in patients with obesity whether incorporating a pro-microbiota diversity diet post BS leads to an improved eating behavior after 12 months, using a comprehensive phenotyping of eating behavior/reward/sensory alterations in ecological conditions, 2) To explore the potential mediating biological pathways to identify specific signatures of the relationship between modifications of GM and food preferences/reward, 3) To further explore at a larger representative cohort the longitudinal associations between GM with food preferences/ intake and the longer-term weight loss success and maintenance of BS. Multidisciplinary BARIA-gut-TASTE involves 4 partners and 2 collaborators, gathering complementary expertise in obesity and BS, food behavior and preferences, nutrition, gut health and microbiota, psychiatry, epidemiology and metabolomics. Being of major relevance for clinical practice, the knowledge developed in BARIA-gut-TASTE will allow to adapt nutritional care of patients undergoing BS on more individual approaches according to the concept of precision medicine.