A gut health research update from Amway R&D
The development
At Amway, we’re big advocates of making healthy diet and lifestyle choices that credible science tells us can contribute to positive changes in the gut environment. We know that a healthy gut plays an important role¹ in digestion, immune health and liver health, to name just a few. One key focus of our Research & Development (R&D) team at Amway is studying how different nutrients from food contribute to proper gut function.
Studies suggest that a healthy gut microbiome and proper gut function may be linked to the production of short-chain fatty acids (SCFAs) by beneficial gut bacteria.² To help us make predictions about how certain nutrients may interact with different gut bacteria, we conducted research with our Korean-based scientific collaborator, H.E.M. Pharma (partially owned by Amway), using their new method for measuring SCFA changes in the ex-vivo (out of the human body but strictly-controlled) environment mimicking the gut microbiome.
The method is the Pharmaceutical Meta-Analysis System³ (PMAS), a high-speed, in vitro (meaning performed in a test tube) method for analyzing fecal matter. It helps predict how dietary nutrients may affect the production of crucial microbiota metabolites that influence gut function.
Why this is significant
PMAS is one of the few microbiome analysis methods commercially available to scientists that can look not only at how different foods may influence the bacterial composition of the microbiome, but also at how the microbiome transforms nutrients. That makes it a strong fit for helping us make predictions about the potential effects of key nutrients on SCFA production.
“SCFAs are chains of six or fewer carbon atoms that are produced when beneficial bacteria in the colon ferment dietary fiber. They are essential to the health of the gut microbiome,” said Matt Runyon, PhD, manager of Science – Chemistry, Investigations, Biology & Imaging at Amway.
“Studies have shown that SCFAs provide energy for our colon cells and microbes, help support healthy immune function, maintain healthy insulin sensitivity and stimulate our nerve signals,” Runyon said. “They are necessary to the integrity of the gut barrier and play a role in many pathways in the nervous system.
“While factors such as age, lifestyle choices, diet, sleep and even the changing seasons can influence changes in SCFA levels, we wanted to understand how particular kinds of nutrients may change the production of SCFAs.”
The focus for this research was production of the three main SCFAs, butyrate, acetate and propionate. Butyrate production was the key target because it can directly affect the growth and differentiation of colon cells4; there is growing evidence suggesting that it is the SCFA with the most influence on human health.5Acetate is key because studies have shown that it is involved in regulating appetite hormones such as GLP-1 and PYY6, and propionate because it can produce fuel7 to help support metabolic processes and energy metabolism.
The team used PMAS to evaluate SCFA production in stool samples from 56 Korean human subjects whose gut microbiomes ranged from low to high bacterial diversity. The samples were cultured in a 96-well plate (a standard tool in research and clinical testing) under controlled conditions. By design, PMAS mimics the humidity, temperature, secreted substances, peristaltic movement (the wave-like contractions that move food through the gut) and other conditions of the human intestinal environment.
The SCFA concentrations in the samples treated with the nutrients were then compared to the samples that were not treated.
“Notably, a common trend was that the samples that started with low bacterial diversity had a greater percent increase in butyrate concentration than the samples that started with high bacterial diversity,” Runyon said.
What happens next
The results provide evidence that supports continued testing and testing with other nutrients, according to Runyon.
“PMAS testing gives us a unique way to predict in a simulated intestinal environment how certain nutrients may cause changes in SCFA concentrations in an actual human’s gut,” he said. “It’s not perfect because testing in a lab dish is not the same as testing in actual humans, but in this lab setting we were able to see how the nutrients we tested impacted the concentration of butyrate in Korean fecal samples. That’s promising insight for Amway R&D as we continue to learn about the gut microbiome.”
Matt Runyon, PhD is manager of Science – Chemistry, Investigations, Biology & Imaging at Amway, where his areas of focus are microbiome, healthy weight, and sciences. He leads a team of biologists, chemists, microbiologists, bioinformaticians, and skin scientists in early-stage discovery, technology innovation, product development, and business sustaining investigations for products that support healthspan – the number of years a person is able to enjoy a healthy, active, and independent life.
1 Hou, K., Wu, ZX., Chen, XY. et al. Microbiota in health and diseases. Sig Transduct Target Ther 7, 135 (2022). https://doi.org/10.1038/s41392-022-00974-4
2 Koh A, De Vadder F, Kovatcheva-Datchary P, Backhed F. From Dietary Fiber to Host Physiology: Short-Chain Fatty Acids as Key Bacterial Metabolites. Cell. 2016;165(6):1332-1345.
3 United States patent no. US11237172B2. Method for screening personalized intestinal environment-improving material and composition therefor. https://patents.google.com/patent/US11237172B2
4 Kendra Hodgkinson, Faiha El Abbar, Peter Dobranowski, Juliana Manoogian, James Butcher, Daniel Figeys, David Mack, Alain Stintzi, Butyrate’s role in human health and the current progress towards its clinical application to treat gastrointestinal disease, Clinical Nutrition, Volume 42, Issue 2, 2023, Pages 61-75, ISSN 0261-5614, https://doi.org/10.1016/j.clnu.2022.10.024.
5 Fusco, W., Lorenzo, M. B., Cintoni, M., Porcari, S., Rinninella, E., Kaitsas, F., Lener, E., Mele, M. C., Gasbarrini, A., Collado, M. C., Cammarota, G., & Ianiro, G. (2023). Short-Chain Fatty-Acid-Producing Bacteria: Key Components of the Human Gut Microbiota. Nutrients, 15(9), 2211.
6 Frost, G., Sleeth, M., Sahuri-Arisoylu, M. et al. The short-chain fatty acid acetate reduces appetite via a central homeostatic mechanism. Nat Commun 5, 3611 (2014). https://doi.org/10.1038/ncomms4611
7 den Besten G, van Eunen K, Groen AK, Venema K, Reijngoud DJ, Bakker BM. The role of short-chain fatty acids in the interplay between diet, gut microbiota, and host energy metabolism. J Lipid Res. 2013 Sep;54(9):2325-40. doi: 10.1194/jlr.R036012. Epub 2013 Jul 2. PMID: 23821742; PMCID: PMC3735932.
