Can Prebiotic Snacks Stimulate Healthy Gut Bacteria If You Are Overweight?

Fiber can help prevent cardiovascular disease, type 2 diabetes, and obesity because it affects the gut microbiota, the community from microorganisms that live in the gut. However, the typical Western diet lacks the fiber that these friendly microbes need to thrive.

Experiments in mice and humans have shown that snacks supplemented with certain fiber types can alter the gut microbiota and cause widespread physiological effects. Fiber for future prebiotic snacks can be obtained from food waste such as crusts, crusts, and shells that manufacturers will cut.

The bacteria, archaebacteria, viruses, also fungi that live in the human gut – commonly known as the gut microbiota – significantly impact physical and mental well-being. Studies show that fiber can help prevent chronic diseases such as cardiovascular disease, type 2 diabetes, and obesity through the diets of these beneficial community members.

However, Western-style foods are often high in fat and lack this fiber. The idea of ​​adding fiber to unhealthy snacks like cookies and chips may seem straightforward, but the relationship between diet, microbiota, and individual health is complex.

Researchers at the Center for Intestinal Microbiome and Nutrition Research at Washington University School of Medicine in St. Louis, Missouri, investigate this relationship to develop prebiotic snacks. In previous work, they identified fiber sources that are not only cheap and readily available — such as frequently discarded husks, husks, and flakes — but also stimulate gut microbes that obese adults tend to overlook.

"With snacks becoming a popular part of the Western diet, we are working to create a new generation of snack formulations that people love and that maintain a healthy gut microbiome that affects many aspects of health," said one senior author. Prof. Jeffrey I. Gordon, Ph.D., leads the Edison Family Center for Genomic Sciences and Systems Biology at the University of Washington School of Medicine.

Snack maker Mondelēz International, which includes belVita, Cadbury, and Oreo, funded some of the work. Then, one by one, they introduced snacks into the mice's diet, supplemented with pea fiber, orange fiber, or barley bran. Finally, there was a washing period between each type of breakfast, during which the mice ate only high-fat, low-fiber foods.

This approach allowed researchers to track the effects of each type of fiber on the gene pool of the animal gut microbiota by analyzing microbial DNA in stool samples.