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Link between gut microbes, diet and illnesses revealed

Date:
January 11, 2021
Source:
King's College London
Summary:
Diets rich in healthy and plant-based foods encourages the presence of gut microbes that are linked to a lower risk of common illnesses including heart disease, research has found.
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Diets rich in healthy and plant-based foods encourages the presence of gut microbes that are linked to a lower risk of common illnesses including heart disease, research has found.

A large-scale international study using metagenomics and blood chemical profiling has uncovered a panel of 15 gut microbes associated with lower risks of common conditions such as obesity and type 2 diabetes. The study has been published today in Nature Medicine from researchers at King's College London, Massachusetts General Hospital (MGH), Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health, the University of Trento, Italy, and health start-up company ZOE.

The PREDICT 1 (Personalized Responses to Dietary Composition Trial 1) analyzed detailed data on the composition of participants' gut microbiomes, their dietary habits, and cardiometabolic blood biomarkers. It uncovered strong links between a person's diet, the microbes in their gut (microbiome) and their health.

Researchers identified microbes that positively or negatively correlate 'good' and 'bad' with an individual's risk of certain serious conditions such as diabetes, heart disease and obesity. Surprisingly, the microbiome has a greater association to these markers than other factors, such as genetics. Some of the identified microbes are so novel that they have not yet been named.

The researchers defined a "healthy" diet as one that contained a mix of foods associated with a lower risk of chronic disease. They found that trial subjects who ate such a diet, or one rich in plants, were more likely to have high levels of specific 'good' gut microbes which are associated with a low risk of common illnesses. The researchers also found microbiome-based biomarkers of obesity as well as markers for cardiovascular disease and impaired glucose tolerance, which are key risk factors for COVID. These findings can be used to help create personalized eating plans designed specifically to improve one's health.

Dr. Sarah Berry, Reader in Nutrition Sciences at King's College London said, "As a nutritional scientist, finding novel microbes that are linked to specific foods, as well as metabolic health, is exciting. Given the highly personalised composition of each individuals' microbiome, our research suggests that we may be able to modify our gut microbiome to optimize our health by choosing the best foods for our unique biology."

For example, the findings reveal that having a microbiome rich in Prevotella copri and Blastocystis species was associated with maintaining a favorable blood sugar level after a meal. Other species were linked to lower post-meal levels of blood fats and markers of inflammation.

Professor Tim Spector, Epidemiologist from King's College London, who started the PREDICT study program and is scientific founder of ZO, said: "When you eat, you're not just nourishing your body, you're feeding the trillions of microbes that live inside your gut."

Nicola Segata, PhD, professor and principal investigator of the Computational Metagenomics Lab at the University of Trento, Italy and leader of the microbiome analysis in the study, said: "We were surprised to see such large, clear groups of what we informally call 'good' and 'bad' microbes emerging from our analysis. It is also exciting to see that microbiologists know so little about many of these microbes that they are not even named yet. This is now a big area of focus for us, as we believe they may open new insights in the future into how we could use the gut microbiome as a modifiable target to improve human metabolism and health."


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Materials provided by King's College London. Note: Content may be edited for style and length.


Journal Reference:

  1. Francesco Asnicar, Sarah E. Berry, Ana M. Valdes, Long H. Nguyen, Gianmarco Piccinno, David A. Drew, Emily Leeming, Rachel Gibson, Caroline Le Roy, Haya Al Khatib, Lucy Francis, Mohsen Mazidi, Olatz Mompeo, Mireia Valles-Colomer, Adrian Tett, Francesco Beghini, Léonard Dubois, Davide Bazzani, Andrew Maltez Thomas, Chloe Mirzayi, Asya Khleborodova, Sehyun Oh, Rachel Hine, Christopher Bonnett, Joan Capdevila, Serge Danzanvilliers, Francesca Giordano, Ludwig Geistlinger, Levi Waldron, Richard Davies, George Hadjigeorgiou, Jonathan Wolf, José M. Ordovás, Christopher Gardner, Paul W. Franks, Andrew T. Chan, Curtis Huttenhower, Tim D. Spector, Nicola Segata. Microbiome connections with host metabolism and habitual diet from 1,098 deeply phenotyped individuals. Nature Medicine, 2021; DOI: 10.1038/s41591-020-01183-8

Cite This Page:

King's College London. "Link between gut microbes, diet and illnesses revealed." ScienceDaily. ScienceDaily, 11 January 2021. <www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2021/01/210111112208.htm>.
King's College London. (2021, January 11). Link between gut microbes, diet and illnesses revealed. ScienceDaily. Retrieved March 28, 2024 from www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2021/01/210111112208.htm
King's College London. "Link between gut microbes, diet and illnesses revealed." ScienceDaily. www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2021/01/210111112208.htm (accessed March 28, 2024).

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