Commercial Strains of Lactic Acid Bacteria with Health Benefits

Abstract

In the 1930s, Lactobacillus casei strain Shirota (LcS) is isolated and intensively cultured by Japanese scientist Dr. Minoru Shirota. Dr. Minoru Shirota initially wanted to find a biological pathway to antagonize pathogenic bacteria. Inspired by Elie Metchnikoff’s theory of longevity in Bulgarian yogurt, Dr. Minoru Shirota worked mainly on the Bulgarian yogurt strain (Lactobacillus delbrueckii subsp. bulgaricus) during his studies. However, the results were not satisfactory. Dr. Minoru Shirota found that the Bulgarian yogurt strain could not be stored in the form of live bacteria. This strain was incapable of tolerating the environment of high acid (stomach) and high bile salt (small intestine) in the digestive tract. Since then, Dr. Minoru Shirota had selected high-activity lactic acid bacteria that can pass through the digestive tract from many strains of lactic acid bacteria based on acid- and bile-tolerant salts. Later, this strain of lactic acid bacteria was named Lactobacillus casei strain Shirota (Sako et al. 2011).