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Updated: Aug 20, 2026

An Intestinal Gut Organ Culture System for Analyzing Host-Microbiota Interactions
Published on: June 30, 2021
Exercise-driven microbiome changes regulate host immunity
Catherine M Phelps1, Marlies Meisel2
1Department of Immunology, University of Pittsburgh School of Medicine, Pittsburgh, PA, USA; Graduate Program of Microbiology and Immunology, University of Pittsburgh School of Medicine, Pittsburgh, PA, USA.
None:
Exercise reshapes host physiology and immunity, yet the mechanisms linking physical activity to disease protection remain incompletely defined. Emerging evidence indicates that exercise remodels the gut microbiome, producing compositional and metabolic adaptations that can regulate immune function. In this Review, we discuss how exercise-responsive microbiota and microbial metabolites, including short-chain fatty acids, secondary bile acids, and the one-carbon metabolite formate, influence systemic inflammation, antitumor CD8 T-cell immunity, autoimmunity, and metabolic disease. Defining causal taxa, microbial metabolic pathways, and host-sensing mechanisms may enable microbiome-informed exercise prescriptions and targeted metabolite-, probiotic-, or postbiotic-based therapies.
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