Why does the same food affect us differently?
People react in different ways to the same foods. For example, some have a higher tolerance for spicy foods than others. To help understand why that is, a new study led by the University of Copenhagen explains that there are differences in our gut bacteria. Individual variations determine how we digest and absorb food. The findings were published in the journal ‘Nature Microbiology’.
No two guts are alike
To track changes in the gut, the researchers used a smart capsule ingested by 50 volunteers during breakfast. The meal consisted of rye bread with butter and jam, a boiled egg, plain yoghurt with nuts, walnuts and blueberries, and a glass of water. The capsule measured pH, temperature and pressure. They discovered major differences in digestion time and gut conditions between the participants. These variations have an effect on nutrient absorption, fermentation and gut bacteria composition. Changes in the gut’s physiology and environment greatly influence our gut microbiome and how food is processed. “We could see, for example, that it took 2 hours for the capsule to pass through the small intestine in some people and 10 hours in others,” explained Henrik Roager, associate professor at the Department of Nutrition, Exercise and Sports, in a news release. “Since we already know that we absorb most of our nutrients in the small intestine, differences in the travel time in the small intestine probably have an impact on how much of the nutrients we absorb and how much passes on to the large intestine, where the gut bacteria kick in.” Roager, who led the study, further elaborated: “We know that pH is a crucial factor in bacterial growth and activity, so it made perfect sense that we could see that gut environment and pH are linked to differences in the composition and activity of the gut bacteria. This means that the environmental conditions we each have in our gut can help explain why we have different bacteria in the gut.”
Nutritional guidelines for better health
Roager believes that the research could prove useful for tailored dietary strategies to enhance nutritional health. “Our results show that we are all unique – also in our gut. We are used to assuming that we all digest and absorb food in the same way and to the same extent, but we can also see that this is not always the case. Our study provides further evidence that individuals react differently to food – and here differences in our gut environment could very well play an important role.”
Keywords
food, gut, bacteria, capsule, pH, nutrient, microbiome, intestine