Question: How can miniature gut organoids be used to investigate and answer key questions about nutrient transport in the gut?

Eva Rath answered on 20 Jun 2023:

Intestinal organoids can take up nutrients, drugs, and other substances like the cells in your gut. If you give nutrients to the organoids, for example different sugars like fructose (a sugar that comes from fruits) and lactose (a sugar that comes from milk) you can investigate how much of the nutrient is absorbed. You can also add mixes of nutrients, because it is known that some nutrients alter the absorption of other nutrients. However, it is not always known why/ how they do this. Together with the nutrients, you can also give substances to the organoids that block certain transporters. By doing so, you can find out which transporter takes up which nutrient. In the case of people with malabsorption, organoids can be grown from their intestines and by comparing “healthy” and “malabsorptive” organoids, the reason of malabsorption can be found.