Big thanks to first authors Anissa Armet and Fuyong Li, team members, and the many collaborators, across @ualberta.bsky.social, @uminnpress.bsky.social, @unihohenheim.bsky.social, Nestle, @apcmicrobiomeirel.bsky.social, @ucc.ie, and @uccmicrobiology.bsky.social.
Benefits are target-specific, arise through microbiome-independent and microbiome-dependent mechanisms, and individualized effects can, in some cases, be predicted from microbiome features. Overall, this supports a more targed and personalized application of fibre supplements.
Conclusions: Although isolated fibres lack the intrinsic structural features of whole-food fibres and therefore show inconsistent population-level effects on cardiometabolic risk markers compared to whole-food approaches (see cell.com/cell/fulltex..., this does not mean they are ineffective.
Some outcomes were microbiome-linked: • AG ↓ ghrelin, linked to shifts in microbial CAZyme genes targeting AG’s specific glycan structures. • ML models predicted BP improvements with AG and CRP reductions with RS4 from microbial pathways and faecal bile acids.
LBP, calprotectin, TNF-α, IL-6, and satiety improved across several groups — including MCC — with no detectable microbiome associations, indicating fermentation-independent mechanisms.
AG and RS4 induced clear, structure-specific shifts in microbiome composition (incl. distinct Bifidobacterium spp.) and SCFAs. But these “prebiotic-like” changes did not explain most physiological outcomes.
To answer those, we compared two fermentable fibres — acacia gum (AG; n=75) and resistant starch type 4 (RS4; n=75) — with a non-fermentable control (MCC; n=45) in adults with excess body weight, integrating clinical outcomes with microbiome, metabolomic, and genomic profiling.
New preprint on @medrxivpreprint.bsky.social from our 6-week RCT comparing two fermentable fibres with a non-fermentable control.
We asked:
• whether fibre effects depend on microbial fermentation
• and whether microbiome differences explain variable responses
🔗 www.medrxiv.org/content/10.1...
Multicenter RCT in @lancetgastrohep.bsky.social:
FMT (with live microbes) prevents recurrent C. diff far better than fecal filtrates.
Thanks to Dina Kao (@ualberta.bsky.social) & @tsbschm.bsky.social from
@apcmicrobiomeirel.bsky.social), and whole team.
🔗 authors.elsevier.com/c/1lphg8nByr...
How has obesity treatment evolved, and where is it heading?
Our new review in Obesity explores:
✔ The central role of nutrition
✔ Precision medicine & microbiome strategies
✔ Integration with emerging therapies
Read here onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/full/10....
#Obesity #Nutrition #PrecisionMedicine
I joined Dr. Karan Rajan to talk about the science of the gut microbiome, how it’s changed through industrialisation, how we can restore it, and the NiMe diet.
Grateful, and humbled, to discuss the #microbiome on a channel with 2M followers.
🎥 Watch here: www.youtube.com/watch?v=sb4d...
With big thanks to @isappscience.bsky.social for organizing the podcast and to @colinhillucc.bsky.social and Daniel Trancredi for being great hosts and for asking very interesting questions.
Great podcast with Anissa Armet PhD RD on our recent @cellpress.bsky.social about the 'Non-industrialized Microbiome Restore (NiMe) Diet'. Covers a lot of the science, but also how Anissa's personal journey with IBD inspired both the research and the diet itself.
Grateful to @natrevgastrohep.nature.com and Jordan Hindson for highlighting our recent @cellpress.bsky.social study on #microbiome restoration.
Great to see our work featured in the Research Highlights section.
📄 Read the original paper: www.cell.com/cell/fulltex...
#MicrobiomeResearch #GutHealth
Thank you to Dalimil Bujdos and Paul O'Toole from @ucc.ie, @uccmicrobiology.bsky.social, and @apcmicrobiomeirel.bsky.social for a fun collaboration that continues to teach me a lot.
aurora was validated on model species. For example, differences in host predictions and proportion of autochthonous strains differ vastly between strictly host-adapted Limosilactobacillus reuteri and nomadic Lactiplantibacillus plantarum.
genomebiology.biomedcentral.com/articles/10....
It is hard to determine habitat adaptations in host-associated bacteria, e.g. because strains might be allochthonous or mislabeled. Here we present aurora, a gwas tool that identifies autochthonous strains and the genes associated with their habitats.
doi.org/10.1186/s130...
I have been teaching classes on the gut #microbiome for almost 20 years and always struggled to have a good book to recommend. Finally there is one. Fergus Shanahan's "Fast Facts: The Gut Microbiome" provides expert insight, is brilliant, and it is free.
doi.org/10.1159/isbn...
Register here for free tickets to the book launch with the Creators, March 10th, Lapps Quay, Cork, Ireland. bit.ly/3EVxa15
Find us on Instagram and Facebook under
@nimediet.
Eat to support your #microbiome. Anissa Armet and I are thrilled to announce our FREE 'science cookbook' on The NiMe Diet, bit.ly/41BV0HW, covering the story behind our research published in @cp-cell.bsky.social. If around Cork, register freely for an evening with the Creators on March 10th.
I am indebted to the two co-leads, Dale Archer and Maria Elisa Perez-Munoz, the students and staff that helped with the experiments, and the many esteemed collaborators that contributed to this work.
We think this work is important as it shows that even a bacterial species considered beneficial can have negative long-term effects on autoimmunity, and it establishes a molecular foundation for strain-specific differences. Relevant for the development of microbial therapeutics.
We found considerable strain-level differences in the effects of L. reuteri to cause spontaneous RR-EAE. R2lc, a strain that activates AhR through the pks gene cluster, resulted in severe EAE, while a pks mutant of R2lc and a pks-negative strain (PB-W1) failed to exacerbate EAE.
Very much to our surprise, a strain of Limosilactobacillus reuteri drives severe pathology in a mouse model of multiple sclerosis. Pathology was driven by a secondary metabolite that hyperactivates the AhR receptor. See our publication in Cell Reports.
www.sciencedirect.com/science/arti...
A new study led by Prof Jens Walter of @apcmicrobiomeirel.bsky.social reveals that a newly developed diet, inspired by the eating habits of non-industrialized societies, can significantly lower the risk of several chronic diseases. Read more here: www.researchireland.ie/news/non-ind...
Thank you to @naturerevmicro.bsky.social and Agustina Taglialegna for highlighting our work on microbiome restoration and the NiMe diet. Really nice summary.
Really nice to see my alma mater, @unihohenheim.bsky.social,
post about our recent study in @cellpress.bsky.social. I spent most of my student years there (they have a historic park and a castle). Big thanks also to Stephan Bischoff and Dr. Benjamin Seethaler for another great collaboration.
Thank you @erictopol.bsky.social for highlighting our work.
For those interested cooking some yummy healthy dishes that feed the #microbiome, all the recipes that were used in this human intervention trial are freely available on our instagram page.
www.instagram.com/nimediet/
#weekendreading🔬
Cardiometabolic benefits of a non-industrialized-type diet are linked to gut microbiome modulation
@cellpress.bsky.social
#microsky #microbiome #diet
www.cell.com/cell/fulltex...
Today we report a new compendium of human gut microbiomes with >168,000 samples
By analyzing this massive dataset, we discovered distinct microbiome patterns across the globe, and show we can predict where a person lives just from their gut bacteria
Now out in Cell:
www.cell.com/cell/fulltex...
