Cláudia Marques, a professor and researcher at NOVA Medical School, has been awarded the 2026 Exploratory Research Grant from the European Society of Clinical Investigation (ESCI) for a project investigating the role of the gut microbiota—specifically bacterial DNA—in the progression from preclinical to clinical obesity. The award was announced during the 60th ESCI Annual Scientific Meeting in Lisbon.
The project addresses an unanswered question in obesity research: why do some overweight individuals maintain normal metabolic parameters—so-called preclinical obesity—while others develop complications such as abnormalities in blood glucose, lipids, or blood pressure, progressing to clinical obesity?
Preliminary results from the team showed that adipose tissue from people with clinical obesity contains more bacterial DNA than that from people with preclinical obesity, and that the composition of the gut microbiota also differs between the two groups. These data raise the hypothesis that components of the microbiota, including bacterial DNA, may translocate into the circulation when the intestinal barrier is compromised, reaching adipose tissue and promoting local inflammation.
With this funding, the team will test this hypothesis in the laboratory by exposing human fat cells to bacterial DNA isolated from adipose tissue samples of individuals with preclinical and clinical obesity, to determine whether this DNA can directly induce inflammation and metabolic dysfunction in the cells.
“I was naturally very pleased and honored to receive this award, which recognizes the scientific significance of the work our team has been doing,” says Cláudia Marques. The researcher emphasizes that the support from ESCI will help fund the additional experiments needed to complete and publish the results of Shámila Isamel’s doctoral dissertation, which she recently completed at NOVA Medical School as part of this project.
This research has the potential to identify new therapeutic targets for obesity, contributing to improved health outcomes for one of the chronic diseases with the highest prevalence and greatest impact on healthcare systems worldwide.
ESCI’s Exploratory Research Grants are intended to support early-stage clinical and translational research projects with high innovative potential for clinical application.