Reference Number: 509
Year: 2013
Link: Link to original paper
Health: Gut Microbiome - Creating Healthier Bread to Support Optimal Gut Health | Mental Health
Nutrition: Prebiotic | Probiotic
Inclusions: Dairy>Milk
Summary
Background & aims: Changes in gut microbiota have been reported to alter signaling mechanisms, emotional behavior, and visceral nociceptive reflexes in rodents. However, alteration of the intestinal microbiota with antibiotics or probiotics has not been shown to produce these changes in humans. We investigated whether consumption of a fermented milk product with probiotic (FMPP) for 4 weeks by healthy women altered brain intrinsic connectivity or responses to emotional attention tasks.
Methods: Healthy women with no gastrointestinal or psychiatric symptoms were randomly assigned to groups given FMPP (n = 12), a nonfermented milk product (n = 11, controls), or no intervention (n = 13) twice daily for 4 weeks. The FMPP contained Bifidobacterium animalis subsp Lactis, Streptococcus thermophiles, Lactobacillus bulgaricus, and Lactococcus lactis subsp Lactis. Participants underwent functional magnetic resonance imaging before and after the intervention to measure brain response to an emotional faces attention task and resting brain activity. Multivariate and region of interest analyses were performed.
Results: FMPP intake was associated with reduced task-related response of a distributed functional network (49% cross-block covariance; P = .004) containing affective, viscerosensory, and somatosensory cortices. Alterations in intrinsic activity of resting brain indicated that ingestion of FMPP was associated with changes in midbrain connectivity, which could explain the observed differences in activity during the task.
Conclusions: Four-week intake of an FMPP by healthy women affected activity of brain regions that control central processing of emotion and sensation.
Significance of this study to the baker:
This study suggests that after 4 weeks of consumption of fermented milk, containing prebiotic oligosaccharides, in combination with a probiotic such as B. lactis, the emotion-forming brain regions of healthy women were positively enhanced. We know that cereal grains used in our bakes contain oligosaccharides too. As we can purchase these probiotic strains now in capsules or powdered forms, we can integrate these live strains into some of our recipes, for example our cultured butter in order to positively enhance our brain health.
