Role of Lactiplantibacillus plantarum UBLP-40, Lactobacillus rhamnosus UBLR-58 and Bifidobacterium longum UBBL-64 in the Wound Healing Process of the Excisional Skin

Abstract

The probiotics <i>Lactiplantibacillus plantarum</i> UBLP-40, <i>Lactobacillus rhamnosus</i> UBLR-58 and <i>Bifidobacterium longum</i> UBBL-64 seem to promote wound healing when applied topically. Our aim was to investigate their effect on the mRNA expression of pro-inflammatory, healing and angiogenetic factors during the healing process of a standardized excisional wound model in rats. Rats subjected to six dorsal skin wounds were allocated to Control; <i>L. plantarum</i>; combined formula of <i>L. rhamnosus</i> plus <i>B. longum</i>; <i>L. rhamnosus</i>; and <i>B. longum</i> treatments, applied every two days, along with tissue collection. The pro-inflammatory, wound-healing, and angiogenetic factors of mRNA expression were assessed by qRT-PCR. We found that <i>L. plantarum</i> exerts a strong anti-inflammatory effect in relation to <i>L. rhamnosus</i>-<i>B. longum</i>, given alone or in combination; the combined regime of <i>L. rhamnosus</i>-<i>B. longum</i>, works better, greatly promoting the expression of healing and angiogenic factors than <i>L. plantarum</i>. When separately tested, <i>L. rhamnosus</i> was found to work better than <i>B. longum</i> in promoting the expression of healing factors, while <i>B. longum</i> seems stronger than <i>L. rhamnosus</i> in the expression of angiogenic factors. We, therefore, suggest that an ideal probiotic treatment should definitively contain more than one probiotic strain to speed up all three healing phases.