How does dietary fibre affect our gut bacteria?

Wednesday, April 13, 2016

How does dietary fibre affect our gut bacteria?

More than 100 trillion micro-organisms, including bacteria, live in our gut and what we eat influences those bacteria.

Now researchers from Massey University and Plant & Food Research are trying to figure out what influence a person’s long-term dietary fibre intake has on how gut bacteria responds to prebiotics.

It’s hoped the study will help researchers discover what can be done to ensure the bacteria living in our gut is “favourable” to optimise our health.

PhD student Genelle Healey from Massey’s School of Food and Nutrition says, “The presence of ‘unfavourable’ bacteria has been linked to obesity, diabetes and some gastrointestinal disorders like inflammatory bowel disease and irritable bowel syndrome.”

Because dietary fibre is not digested by humans, it instead reaches the large bowel where it is used by the gut bacteria as a source of energy. Prebiotics are types of dietary fibre shown to improve our health through their actions on ‘favourable’ gut bacteria.

Foods rich in dietary fibre include fruits, vegetables, wholegrain breads and cereals, legumes, nuts and seeds. Some people consume a large amount of dietary fibre while others consume much less.

“We believe that if someone is already consuming foods high in dietary fibre, the gut bacteria will probably respond in a different way to prebiotics, compared to the gut bacteria of an individual with a lower dietary fibre intake,” says Mrs Healey.

She says as well as finding out what influence long-term diet has on the gut bacteria, participants will also have their body composition analysed using the BodPod, as there may be links between body composition and the types of bacteria present in the gut. The BodPod measures a person’s fat mass and lean mass (muscle, bone etc).

Researchers are looking for healthy people aged between 19-65 years with a low intake of fruit, vegetables, wholegrain cereals, legumes and nuts and seeds to participate in the study. Participants must be based in Manawatū.

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