5 ms·

"If you want to stay lean, you'll want bacteria that are not very efficient" I hope this article isn't suggesting that it is preferable to have less efficient

"If you want to stay lean, you'll want bacteria that are not very efficient" I hope this article isn't suggesting that it is preferable to have less efficient digestive systems so that we can all eat more. Given the environmental impact of food production these efficient digestion microbes are something we should encourage. Maybe they are harmful because of insulin spikes ? But the article doesn't mention this.

speeder 11y ago
The problem is the efficiency in different things. I have a disease that makes me very inefficient in absorbing protein and vitamins. The amount of stuff (in both food, and actual medicinal supplements) I consume to just keep my body working, of course has calories in it, I don't want a efficient calorie absorption...
jobu 11y ago
That seems to be the suggestion, but I wonder if it's the the wrong hypothesis. What if some bacteria have evolved to "hack" the metabolic signals from our guts (and possibly other mammals)? They could stimulate ghrelin to make us want more food to feed them. Or slow down food progress through the gut to give them more time to reproduce.
- CuriouslyC 11y ago
  You're partly right. The primary byproduct of bacterial fermentation is short-chain fatty acids. These do in fact stimulate the release of peptide YY, which reduces gastric motility. It is extremely unlikely that the bacteria are the ones "hacking" us though; short chain fatty acid production is the result of fairly ubiquitous, low level pathways whereas modulation of hormone release is a fairly specialized, high level function.
zurn 11y ago
The energy surplus builds up obesity is on the order of 1%. It's not nothing, but it is marginal compared to the effect of food type choices do to the environment. Environmentally the chief problem is that we are gorging ourselves on luxury foods (red meat as prime offender) that do enormous amounts of environmental damage and are actively harmful to our bodies. More broadly using the majority of farmland for animal feed is the issue. We need a major shift of diets to veggie. (Awareness of animal treatment issues in the meat industry would help the cause too, but tangential issue...)

speeder 11y ago

The problem is the efficiency in different things. I have a disease that makes me very inefficient in absorbing protein and vitamins. The amount of stuff (in both food, and actual medicinal supplements) I consume to just keep my body working, of course has calories in it, I don't want a efficient calorie absorption...

jobu 11y ago

That seems to be the suggestion, but I wonder if it's the the wrong hypothesis. What if some bacteria have evolved to "hack" the metabolic signals from our guts (and possibly other mammals)? They could stimulate ghrelin to make us want more food to feed them. Or slow down food progress through the gut to give them more time to reproduce.

CuriouslyC 11y ago
You're partly right. The primary byproduct of bacterial fermentation is short-chain fatty acids. These do in fact stimulate the release of peptide YY, which reduces gastric motility. It is extremely unlikely that the bacteria are the ones "hacking" us though; short chain fatty acid production is the result of fairly ubiquitous, low level pathways whereas modulation of hormone release is a fairly specialized, high level function.

zurn 11y ago

The energy surplus builds up obesity is on the order of 1%. It's not nothing, but it is marginal compared to the effect of food type choices do to the environment. Environmentally the chief problem is that we are gorging ourselves on luxury foods (red meat as prime offender) that do enormous amounts of environmental damage and are actively harmful to our bodies. More broadly using the majority of farmland for animal feed is the issue. We need a major shift of diets to veggie. (Awareness of animal treatment issues in the meat industry would help the cause too, but tangential issue...)