5 ms·
Wheat gluten spurs brain inflammation in mice
- gardenfelder 3y agothe paper: https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/jne.13326 https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/jne.13326
- yosito 3y agoI appreciate the clarity in the title that this study was in mice. At the same time, as a celiac, the title is basically common sense and I don't need a study to tell me that this applies to humans. One microscopic bread crumb and I'll have brain fog for a week.
- dehrmann 3y ago> the title is basically common sense and I don't need a study to tell me that this applies to humans Not sure how this is common sense. If it were mice engineered to have celiac disease or recently diagnosed humans, it might make sense. Extrapolating it to the general population of a different species in a part of the body not related to digestion is a bit of a leap.
- yosito 3y agoWhat I mean to say is that it is common sense to a celiac that gluten causes inflammation throughout the body and brain even of non-celiacs. I'm not extrapolating from the study, just saying that the study is concluding something that was already pretty obvious to many people.
- swsieber 3y ago> [I]t is common sense to a _celiac_ that gluten causes inflammation throughout the body and brain even of _non-celiacs_ (emphasis mine) I don't follow how this is common sense. It looks like extrapolating from your condition (celiac) and projecting it onto those that don't have your condition (non-celiacs).
- lame-robot-hoax 3y agoHow is that common sense?
- Zak 3y ago> One microscopic bread crumb and I'll have brain fog for a week. It's widely known that a bread crumb will have harmful effects if you have celiac disease. A human who has a peanut allergy will have very negative effects from eating a fraction of a peanut. It's also widely known that foods that are fine for one species can have toxic effects in others. A well-known example is that chocolate is fine for humans (in moderation) but deadly to dogs in similar quantities. A finding that humans without an allergy or hypersensitivity to it react to wheat gluten with brain inflammation would be big news, as would a finding that a large fraction of the human population has a hypersensitivity.
- CharlieDigital 3y agoCan't speak much for the science, but anecdotally, my wife started cutting out wheat from her diet and noticed a significant decrease in feeling of a general sense of "bloat". I suspect that many folks probably have some sort of wheat gluten intolerance/sensitivity with symptoms that probably go unattributed to wheat gluten.
- 2OEH8eoCRo0 3y agoI think that's just something that excess carbs can do.
- DropInIn 3y agoHave you/she looked at FODMAP? https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/FODMAP https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/FODMAP It's a thing that's been messing me up for ages and only just got suggested as the cause/trigger for some remaining allergy like symptoms after my allergies went away (lots of issues besides it, it's just a trigger).
- dkga 3y agoI cut gluten from my diet more than one year ago. After the first two or three months I started noticing the effects: I never felt better in my whole life, my weight went down to what a normal figure for me would be, a lot of people told me I looked less bloated and chronic pains I had diminished substantially. I’m sticking with a gluten-free diet unless I’m lost in a jungle in Italy and all I can I find to eat and save my life has gluten.
- rjsw 3y agoItaly is good for gluten-free food.
- ndsipa_pomu 3y agoI'm not sure about Italy's jungles (https://ecobnb.com/blog/2017/01/vallone-dei-mulini-sorrento/ https://ecobnb.com/blog/2017/01/vallone-dei-mulini-sorrento/), but I found that Rome was superb for eating gluten free. Recently went to Naples, however and found that wasn't nearly as accommodating. (I'm not celiac, but find that gluten is a trigger for my psoriasis)
- wnolens 3y agoIt was surprising to me when I went to Italy and found them incredibly accommodating to different dietary needs. How could someone gluten-free survive in the land of pasta?! Well I was on a week long group tour and of the two Italian guides with us, one was vegan and the other gluten-free. Turns out their love for food and the ritual of eating means they're going to make you happy, all you have to do is ask. Restaurants advertised specifically as gluten-free or vegan were to make tourists comfortable, but I was told to avoid them and just goto a locals spot and make a request.
- seabass-labrax 3y agoA relative of mine said much the same thing after visiting Milan; even the local ice cream shop was able to provide for a gluten/dairy/soya-free and vegetarian person a fresh bowl of fruit! I'm not sure any ice cream shop where I live would even have fresh fruit in their refrigerators.
- dboreham 3y agoTastes so good though.
- jossclimb 3y agoThis makes sense. We tend to think of wheat as being a wholesome natural food source, but modern wheat is far from that. It's genetically engineered and drenched in herbicide far beyond its original easily digested form.
- azeirah 3y agoWhat do herbicides have to do with this study? They added gluten to the diet, not wheat.
- thrill 3y agoWhile all grains contain gluten, the article specifically says they added the glutens from wheat for this study.
- SoftTalker 3y agoEven in ancient times, wheat products and bread have always been cheap "filler" foods. It's calories, easy to store and transport, will keep you alive, and most people tolerate it well, but it's not really healthy food.
- deleted 3y ago[deleted]
- roboror 3y agoHumans have been genetically engineering plants for thousands of years. Let's not reduce that to a boogeyman.
- DarkNova6 3y agoWhile interesting, the next major step would be to find out how wheat production influences the impact of this effect. We already know for animal products that organic growth yields more omega 3 and contributes little towards inflammation.
- ndsipa_pomu 3y agoWell, humans have been selecting for high levels of gluten in wheat for decades (centuries?) so that bread can become lighter and fluffier, but other than that, gluten is naturally occurring in many grains.
- hammock 3y agoThere is also the question of pesticide use
- ndsipa_pomu 3y agoThat's a more general question as plenty of non-gluten containing crops will be grown with pesticide use. I believe this particular experiment didn't use whole grains, and so the pesticides are likely irrelevant.
- hammock 3y agoThis experiment also didn’t use any of the other non-gluten containing crops you refer to. I agree, further study is warranted
- DarkNova6 3y agoI found this to be a question of culture. In my country (EU), it is common to eat dark bread or sourdough. In mediterranean countries you have much white bread, but pretty good quality. And the "bread" I know from the US looks super artificial to me.
- hammock 3y agoWhat is the source of the gluten they used, wheat that was desiccated with Roundup? Did they try gluten from organic wheat? It is known that wheat products from the EU (where Roundup is banned) such as Italian pasta (for which bronze pasta extruders are used instead of PFAS-coated ones) do not cause the same inflammation as wheat products from the USA
- deleted 3y ago[deleted]
- hombre_fatal 3y agoSo gluten had no impact on mice eating a low fat diet but it increased body mass on mice getting 60% of calories from fats. Yet they also explain that those mice didn’t eat nor expend more calories. wat?
- aradox66 3y agoGaining and losing body mass has to do with all kinds of complex biochemistry beyond calories in.
- zer8k 3y ago> (In Mice) Most important thing. A lot of people claim to have a gluten allergy. They have blood tests for that. As far as we are concerned, in humans, gluten is not bad unless you have the allergy. If you think wheat is causing you problems the blood test is cheap and will tell you what you need to know. I am convinced otherwise people are mixing up cause and effect. Cutting out gluten from your life also cuts out a sizeable source of calories. Not overeating, weight loss, etc are all associated with lower inflammatory states. This would certainly explain the ambiguous "I feel better" from most people who claim removing gluten fixed their problems.
- hombre_fatal 3y agoThis is the effect everyone claims when they try any diet. Even the faddiest of fad diets might be the first time in decades they've eaten consciously and, what do you know, they are losing weight when they aren't on autopilot filling their gullet. But the weight loss didn't come from a calorie deficit, of course. It came from some magical interaction that seed oils / gluten / MSG / vegetables were having in their body.
- wnolens 3y agoStrongly disagree here. You're denying that the constituents of food matter and that it's all calories. No one is "allergic" to sugar but it has an effect on the body. Cutting out sugar is (or at least FEELS) different than cutting out the same number of calories in vegetables or meat. There's no (known/convenient) blood test for so many dietary idiosyncrasies.
- zer8k 3y agoThe celiac disease test covers most cases of gluten sensitivity. Of the non-celiac gluten sensitive people the rest of them can be found (trivially) with in-office tests at a gastroenterologist. Most gluten containing products also contain simple carbohydrate. Could it be a reduction in insulin resistance? Possibly. Point being, there are tests for this. In fact, a GI can test for many (but probably not all) serious dietary problems.
- petercooper 3y ago100% anecdata but my dad had (diagnosed) celiac disease. Did the diet for a while then got stubborn and decided to keep throwing in regular bread and beer rather than be "miserable." Fast forward a couple of years of agonizing pain, first in the gut then in his head, and he had three brain haemorrhages and now lives in 24/7 care with no memories or language in a daydream most of the day. I've long suspected it was gluten induced inflammation, so stories like this are interesting to see.
- seabass-labrax 3y agoI know it's not usual HN-stock, but I feel that I must offer my condolences. Good luck to both you and your father.
- lylejantzi3rd 3y agoThe fat used for both diets (LFH and HFD) are lard and soya bean oil. I'd be interested what results they get with tallow or stearic acid.
- electrondood 3y agoThe original paper doesn't describe how the "wheat gluten" was isolated or where it came from, but one possible confounder is... mold. Grains generally have high mold content, especially flour and oats. This could be a confounder, or even the actual cause. [0] https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/jne.13326 https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/jne.13326
- zwieback 3y agoThe last two paragraphs are key, reminding us that replacing gluten carries its own health risks.