"Deep within your gut lives a bustling world of microbes, each playing a role in digesting your food. Among them is one unusual microbe that produces methane -- a gas more often associated with cows and landfills than humans. According to new research from Arizona State University (ASU), this methane-making microorganism may influence how many calories your body extracts from what you eat."
"Microbes and the Energy Hidden in Fiber The study found that people whose microbiomes generate more methane tend to extract more energy from high-fiber foods. This may help explain why the same meal can provide different calorie counts for different individuals once it reaches the colon. Researchers emphasized that high-fiber foods remain beneficial. People generally absorb more calories from a typical Western diet high in processed foods, regardless of methane levels."
Some human gut microbiomes produce large amounts of methane while others produce very little. People with methane-rich microbiomes tend to extract more energy from high-fiber foods, increasing caloric harvest in the colon. High-fiber foods remain beneficial, but calorie absorption varies by individual microbial activity. Typical Western diets high in processed foods lead to greater overall calorie absorption regardless of methane levels. Variation in fiber-rich diet calorie extraction implies that gut methane production influences individual responses to the same dietary intake. Gut methane measurements could inform personalized nutrition and diet interventions tailored to microbial composition.
Read at ScienceDaily
Unable to calculate read time
Collection
[
|
...
]