A new study shows how gut bacteria may explain the acclaimed benefits of the ‘Mediterranean diet.’
The Mediterranean diet is a broad and loose term that generally alludes to it to the foods eaten in Greece, southern Italy and parts of Spain. Unfortunately, this doesn’t mean you should eat a pepperoni pizza and a bottle of wine every night, but it refers to a rich diet in vegetables, fruits, legumes, nuts, beans, grains, grains, fish and unsaturated fats such as olive oil. Eating these foods regularly has been linked to a variety of positive health effects, especially for the heart and cardiovascular system.
In a new study, reported this week in the journal Nature Medicine, scientists argue that some of the health benefits of the Mediterranean diet may be related to how the diet interacts with our gut microbiome.
The trillions of bacteria, viruses, protozoa and fungi that live in the human intestinal tract are much more than passive guests. They are also known play a central role in our body’s metabolism, nutrition and immune function, which can affect our overall health and even our mood.
Researchers at Harvard’s TH Chan School of Public Health looked at the health and gut microbiome of more than 300 healthy men. In addition to taking poo samples every six months for two years, they were also asked to complete a questionnaire about their diet. They found that those following a Mediterranean diet had a remarkably different composition of gut bacteria, namely high concentrations of important dietary fiber metabolizers, such as Faecalibacterium prausnitzii and Bacteroides cellulosilyticus
Furthermore, the presence of one bacterial species, known as Prevotella cover, turned out to have a particularly interesting link with cardiovascular health. The researchers found that people with reduced levels of P. cover seem to have experienced more of the positive effects of the Mediterranean diet on cardiometabolic disease. In other words, people with little or none P. cover reap more of the benefits of the Mediterranean diet.
The researchers are not sure why P. cover seems to have this link, but they have a few ideas. First, it may simply be that unhealthy diets, which increase the risk of cardiovascular disease, can increase the growth of blood pressure P. coverAlternatively, individuals cannot wear it P. cover in the gut, the microbiome can more efficiently and effectively metabolize components of the Mediterranean diet, obtaining more of its cardioprotective effects.
However, the exact nature of this relationship remains speculation for now. The researchers point out that their study was purely observational and their ability to understand the underlying mechanism behind the patterns they observed was limited. They also note that the interactions between the microbiome and the diet are a hugely inconvenient thing. There are many different subclades of it P. cover can be found in various populations around the world, most likely due to differences in diet and lifestyle, and not all clades can interact with the Mediterranean diet in the manner shown here.
That said, this research is a great example of how new research is shedding light on the mechanisms underlying the relationship between the microorganisms living in us and diseases.