Indigestible starch helps against fatty liver

Eating more indigestible starch reduces the amount of fat in the liver in people with fatty liver disease. This is because the intestinal flora improves as a result, according to Chinese research See this week In the scientific journal cell metabolism. If mice with fatty livers received the gut bacteria of these treated people, their livers would become smaller and the amount of fat in them would be reduced.

Fatty liver is affected not only by alcoholics, but also by people who do not drink alcohol excessively, often due to an unhealthy lifestyle. Non-alcoholic fatty liver disease (NAFLD) is the most common liver disease, affecting more than a quarter of the world’s population. In the Netherlands, 2.5 million people suffer from it. In one in three patients, the disease progresses to acute inflammation of the liver, non-alcoholic steatohepatitis (NASH), which can lead to liver damage and liver cancer. There is no cure for this disease yet, so scientists are looking for ways to prevent the condition. One of these ways is through gut bacteria.

Unripe bananas

Resistant starch cannot be digested into sugars in the human small intestine. The right enzymes are missing for this. In the large intestine, this indigestible fiber is food for beneficial gut bacteria. There are different types of resistant starch, including grains, seeds, unripe bananas, legumes, and raw potatoes, but also boiled and then cooled potatoes, rice, and pasta.

For four months, 99 Chinese adults with non-alcoholic fatty liver disease drank a large glass of water containing 20 grams of indigestible starch from a specific type of corn (high-amylose corn) twice daily before meals. A similar group of other patients were given regular starch. In addition, all participants received dietary advice from a nutritionist.

Four months later, the amount of triglycerides in the liver was about 40 percent lower in the treatment group than in the control group. MRI scans revealed that there was significantly less fat in the liver and around other organs. All types of inflammatory values ​​and liver enzymes also improved, which indicates less damage to the liver.

An improvement of 40 percent is impressive, says Stijn Minkmann, a liver researcher at the University of California, San Diego (USA) who was not involved in this study. He was deeply impressed by the scope of the study. Part of the improvement in liver fat was due to weight loss. The group receiving resistant starch lost more weight during the study than the control group. Good thing the researchers have corrected that. Their analysis shows that approximately 6% of the reduction in liver fat occurs independently. about losing weight.

In the treated participants, the composition of the gut bacteria also changed, in contrast to the control group. Specifically, the bacterial strain dung bacteria was less present. The researchers showed that the decomposition products of this strain of bacteria have a negative effect on lipid metabolism in the liver.

Enhanced configuration

Conversely, a test in mice showed that the beneficial effects on liver fat do indeed occur thanks to the improved composition of intestinal bacteria. Mice that were fed high-fat and cholesterol-rich foods for weeks to fatten up their livers received fecal transplants from treated patients or from controls. The mice that received the treated feces lost more weight, had smaller livers, less fatty tissue, and less inflammation.

The researchers concluded that resistant starch could be a simple treatment for non-alcoholic fatty liver disease. The findings could help develop new therapies that positively affect the microbiome.