The Real Superfood!

I’d like to introduce you to the real superfood. It seems like there is always a new superfood that you need to add to your diet. It gets super hyped for a while, usually because some celebrity promotes it. The funding dies down, the promotion wanes, and they move on to the next thing they want to sell. Well, this superfood is different and is unlikely to be endorsed by a celebrity. However, it has been endorsed by many scientific studies.

This food has been shown to:

• Protect you from pathogenic bacteria
• Balance your glucose
• Regulate your immune responses and inflammation
• Helps control appetite
• Suppresses tumors
• Regulates the nervous system
• increases calcium absorption in adolescents
• Reduces anxiety and depression
• Improves cognition in Alzheimers patients
• Reduces cravings in alcoholics

Sounds like really good stuff, right! Why wouldn’t this be promoted and educated to the general public? Well, I think it’s because it isn’t sexy. Its only promotion is as a treatment for constipation.

I think you may have just guessed it. It’s FIBER!

An American eating a typical American diet gets less than 15 gms of fiber a day. One study showed that only 5% of Americans get enough fiber. Most studies I’ve read say you should get 50 or more gms per day! People eating some version of a low-carb diet get even less.

The most common question I get when someone finds out I only eat plants is, “How do you get enough protein?”. I’ve started asking them, “How do you get enough fiber?” I do highly recommend that you increase the fiber in your diet slowly. Your gut will rebel if you suddenly switch to a high fiber diet. Some my plan was to slowly add more plant based meals to my week. I started with one or two plant-based meals a week and slowly added more and more until I went completely plant-based in Nov. 2019.

How does fiber accomplish all these items listed above? Keep reading if you want the scientific details. Warning: I’m about to nerd out!

Basically fiber feeds the beneficial gut bacteria (our microbiome) and the bacteria do the rest. Our gut contains about 10 bacteria per cell we have in our body! Trillions! Keeping out gut biome happy has become a multi-billion dollar business. There are huge numbers of probiotics and prebiotics for sale on the grocery store shelves. The good news is you don’t need to spend a dime on any of them. Probiotics are capsules full of bacteria. There have been many studies done on these. Many not done very well. They are able to show improvements in some of the things listed above in these studies. Pre-biotics are products that “feed” the good bacteria to promote their health and function. To get the benefits of probiotics you have to keep taking them. You take them, they do some good, and then they die, because they don’t have enough food. Prebiotics make more sense, but are very expensive. What’s really in a prebioitc? FIBER!.

Guess where you can get plenty of fiber every day without supplements. Fruits and vegetables! Meat has no fiber at all. Animal products (meat and dairy) have protein and fat (and antibiotics and hormones). Fruits and veggies have protein, fat, fiber, and vitamins and minerals. Look for recipes on this blog for delicious options.

Here is a good article with many details on how fiber affects our health.
Some of these benefits still need more study, but there is very good evidence at the moment. This article contains links to many scientific studies if you really want to dig in. Below is my summary of the article.

• It starts when you eat fiber.
• Your microbiota feed on the fiber to make short-chain fatty acids (SCFAs) and several gases.
  • Short-chain fatty acids include:
    • Acetate
    • Propionate
    • Butyrate
      • Protects against pathogenic bacteria
      • Helps maintain gut barrier function by:
        • Stimulating the production of mucin, antimicrobial peptides, tight-junction proteins, and reducing oxidative stress
  • These have to be produced in an anaerobic (no oxygen) environment, which our colon is perfect for.
• The SCFAs activate receptors on several different cell types.
  • Intestinal epithelial cells
  • Macrophages
  • Dendritic cells
  • Mast cells
  • They act as
    • An energy source
    • Promoting glucose and energy homeostasis
    • Regulate immune responses and inflammation
    • Regulate anorectic hormones
      • Role in appetite control
    • Tumor suppression (esp. butyrate)
    • Regulate central and peripheral nervous systems.

• Dietary prebiotics have been defined as
  • “a selectively fermented ingredient that results in specific changes in the composition and/or activity of the gastrointestinal microbiota, thus conferring benefit(s) upon host health”
  • https://www.researchgate.net/profile/Shahrul_Sarbini/publication/235830036_Prebiotics_Metabolism_Structure_and_Function/links/00b7d514d31ac6d1fd000000.pdf
  • Consensus Statement: “a substrate that is selectively utilized by host microorganisms conferring a health benefit”
  • https://www.nature.com/articles/nrgastro.2017.75.pdf?origin=ppub
• Fermentation of dietary prebiotics in the gut involves metabolic cross-feeding where the products of fermentation by one or more bacterial species provide the substrate(s) for other bacterial species. This complex cooperative activity of the gut microbiota is essential for good health

Effect of prebiotics on gut function and health. The figure indicates likely mechanism of prebiotic action in the gut. In many cases the suggested mechanisms are speculative at the present time. Physiological functions are in purple and health outcomes are in green. Abbreviations: FFAR2/GPR43, free fatty acid receptor 2; FFAR3/GPR41 free fatty acid receptor 3; GLP-1, glucagon-like peptide 1; GLP-2, glucagon-like peptide 2; IFN-γ, interferon gamma; IL-1β, interleukin 1 beta; IL-6, interleukin 6; IL-10, interleukin 10; LPS, lipopolysaccharide; NK, natural killer cells; PYY, peptide YY; Th, T helper cells; TGF-β, transforming growth factor beta; Tr, T regulatory cells; ZO-1 zona occuldens protein 1

• Controls Satiety
  • Meta-analysis of 26 randomized controlled trials (RCTs) involving 831 healthy adults show dietary prebiotic supplementation lead to a significant increased feeling of satiety.
  • Metabolic benefits of dietary prebiotics in human subjects: a systematic review of randomised controlled trials. Kellow NJ, Coughlan, Reid CM Br J Nutr. 2014 Apr 14; 111(7):1147-61. [PubMed] [Ref list]

• Treats constipation
  • Meta-Analysis of RCTs reported significantly improved bowel function when supplemented with inulin (a prebiotic fiber)
    • Effectiveness of inulin intake on indicators of chronic constipation; a meta-analysis of controlled randomized clinical trials.
    • Collado Yurrita L, San Mauro Martín I, Ciudad-Cabañas MJ, Calle-Purón ME, Hernández Cabria M Nutr Hosp. 2014 Aug 1; 30(2):244-52. [PubMed] [Ref list]
    • Effect of consumption of chicory inulin on bowel function in healthy subjects with constipation: a randomized, double-blind, placebo-controlled trial. Micka A, Siepelmeyer A, Holz A, Theis S, Schön C Int J Food Sci Nutr. 2017 Feb; 68(1):82-89. [PubMed] [Ref list]

• Reduced Toxins
  • Protein metabolism can lead to toxins that show in the urine. (p-cresol and ammonia) and serum (p-cresyl sulphate)
  • Increases calcium absorption in adolescents
  • They may exert a beneficial effect on the gut mucosal barrier independent of their interactions with the microbiota.
  • Can inhibit adherence of enteropathogenic E. coli.

Intestinal barrier

• Multiple lines of defense
  • Commensal (good) bacteria
    • Lactobacillus plantarum
      • Regulate intestinal epithelial integrity
      • Also have seen benefits with Lactobacillus acidophilus, L. casei, and L. rhamnosus
  • See this link for an extensive review of probiotics
    • Can probiotics modulate human disease by impacting intestinal barrier function? Bron PA, Kleerebezem M, Brummer RJ, Cani PD, Mercenier A, MacDonald TT, Garcia-Ródenas CL, Wells JM Br J Nutr. 2017 Jan; 117(1):93-107. [PubMed] [Ref list]

What happens when you don’t have a healthy microbiome:

• If the barrier between your gut and you is disrupted or injured you can get these effects.
  • Local and/or systemic immune response
  • Mast cell degranulation – releases many inflammatory molecules meant to destroy pathogenic bacteria and viruses.
  • Neuroinflammation
  • Afferent vagus nerve activation – This leads to a direct effect of inflammation to your hypothalamus which will then affect many body functions.
• What adversely affects the microbiome
  • Antibiotics
  • Lack of fiber in the diet
  • Proton Pump Inhibitors (PPIs) (Prilosec, Prevacid, Protonix, Nexium, etc.) Lifelines Study from Netherlands
    • Deplete beneficial bacteria
    • Increased incidence of enteric infections (C. diff and Campylobacter)

• What happens when you gut microbiome is imbalanced?
  • Plays a significant role in Irritable Bowel Syndrome (IBS) and Inflammatory Bowel Disease (IBD like Chron’s and Ulcerative Colitis)
  • Allergies
  • Asthma
  • Type 1 diabetes
  • Cardiovascular disease
  • Metabolic Syndrome
  • Obesity
• How does your microbiome affect your brain?
  • Placebo-controlled RCTs
    • In healthy women, ingestion of Bifidobacterium animalis, subsp. Lactis, Streptococcus thermophiles, and two Lactobacillus spp. Produced significant changes in brain activity on functional MRI.
    • Lactobacillus hlveticus and Bifidobacterium longum showed beneficial psychological effects in healthy human volunteers with significant improvements in reduction in anxiety and depression
    • Two Bifidobacterium spp and five Lactobacillus spp. Produced a significant reduction in overall negative thoughts to sad mood.
    • Two lactobacillus spp. Plus Bifidobacterium bifidum significantly reduced depression, serum insulin levels, and C Reactive Protein (CRP) and a significant increase in plasma total glutathione concentrations.
    • Three Lactobacillus spp. Plus Bifidobacterium bifidum significantly improved the Mini-mental state examination scores and produced significant changes in a range of metabolic parameters in Alzheimer’s patients.
  • Other studies
    • Alcohol-dependent subjects with increased permeability of their intestines had significantly higher scores of depression, anxiety, and alcohol craving following 3 weeks of abstinence.
  • The underlying mechanisms of these interactions are largely unclear and, at the present time, it is not possible to differentiate between the microbes involved.