Christina Heiss
Doctoral student
MSc
The research of my PhD thesis focuses on the role of the gut microbiota in central energy balance regulation.
The gut microbiota is known to affect the host’s metabolism and play role in the development of obesity. Microbially produced metabolites can directly or indirectly affect the central nervous system including the mediobasal hypothalamus with the arcuate nucleus, involved in energy balance regulation. Obesity is often accompanied by leptin resistance and it is further linked to hypothalamic inflammation. My research focuses therefore on the role of the gut microbiota in development of diet-induced hypothalamic inflammation and in leptin sensitivity. Another focus of my PhD thesis lies on the role of the gut microbiota in the development of the central nervous system, more precisely the blood-brain barrier in the mediobasal hypothalamus and the development of obesity-promoting and -suppressing neurons in the hypothalamus.