Short communication: Dietary bovine milk-derived exosomes improve bone health in an osteoporosis-induced mouse model

Abstract

Osteoporosis is a systemic skeletal disease character-ized by low bone mass and micro-architectural dete-rioration of bone tissue, with a consequent increase in bone fragility and fracture susceptibility. In an aged so-ciety with increased life expectancy, the incidence rate of osteoporosis is also rapidly increasing. Inadequate nutrition may negatively influence bone metabolism. Recently, many studies have investigated the function-ality of milk-derived exosomes, which play important roles in cell-to-cell communication. However, there are few reports of how milk-derived exosomes influence osteoblast proliferation and differentiation. Here, we determined whether bovine colostrum-derived exo-somes promote anti-osteoporosis in vitro and in vivo. Tartrate-resistant acid phosphatase & ndash;stained cells were significantly inhibited in Raw264.7 cells treated with exosomes, indicating reduced osteoclast differentiation. We induced osteoporosis in mice using glucocorticoid pellets after orally administering exosomes for 2 mo. Interestingly, the bone mineral density of exosome-fed mouse groups was significantly improved compared with the glucocorticoid-induced osteoporosis group without exosome treatment. In addition, Lactobacil-lus were decreased in the gut microbiota community of osteoporosis-induced mice, but the gut microbiota community composition was effectively restored by exo-some intake. Taken together, we propose that exosomes isolated from bovine colostrum could be a potential candidate for osteoporosis prevention, bone remodeling improvement, and inhibition of bone resorption. To our knowledge, this is the first time that a protective effect of milk exosomes against osteoporosis has been demonstrated in vivo. Our results strongly suggest that bovine colostrum exosomes might be used as a prophylaxis to prevent the onset of osteoporosis. Indeed, our results offer promising alternative strategies in the nutritional management of age-related bone complications.