We are increasingly clear that our microbiome is key to our health. Our protein sources can also alter it

Little by little We started realizing Of the importance of our microbiota, especially as regards the microorganisms that inhabit our digestive system, our gastrointestinal microbioma. Aspects of our health that in principle They would not seem connected To what happens in our intestines seem to have some kind of correlation with that flora of fungi and bacteria that coexists inside us.

Different proteins, different microbiome. A recent study has observed That the food source of protein can alter the composition and structure of our intestinal microbiome, that is, of the set of microorganisms that inhabits our digestive system. The experiment, conducted with mice, observed important variations in the microbiota associated with changes in the diet.

“The composition of gastric microbiome changed significantly every time we change the protein source,” pointed in a press release Alfredo Blakeley-Ruiz, co-author of the study. “Protein sources with the greatest functional effects were integral rice, yeast and egg whites.”

A variety of sources. Proteins are a key nutrient that gives us essential amino acids with which our body is able to synthesize its own proteins. Foods of animal origin such as meats, fish or eggs are usually seen as the main source of amino acids, but they are not the only one.

The existence of alternatives implies the possibility of diverse effects on our health and well -being. Through, for example, of the microbiome.

Metabolizing amino acids. The team resorted to its study to the use of high -resolution mass spectrometry and the combination of metagenomic and metaproteinomic. Everything to find how the intestinal microbiome of mice whose diet was altered so that each week they received their single source proteins that was changed after seven days ..

They observed that some of these sources were associated with important changes. These changes, Explain the teamthey manifested in how the mice metabolized the amino acids, but also in the way in which their digestive system degraded complex sugars, something that was not so intuitive.

Diets such as those based on the integral rice and the clearing of the eggs, continue to explain the equipment, increased the degradation of the amino acids, which would imply that the microorganisms of the digestive system of the mice were breaking the proteins to obtain their own amino acids. The details of the study were published recently In an article in The Isme Journal.

An environment (too much?) Controlled. The team responsible for the study admitted That there are some limitations to consider, and one of them is the complexity of the diet. In a laboratory environment, the team altered the diet of the mice radically (causing them to have a single source of protein).

Beyond the fact that studies with animal models are not always transposed identically in humans, it is expected that forceful changes in the diet of these animals entail important changes in the structure of their microbiome. A more varied diet, with diverse sources of proteins, would logically imply more dim effects.

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