Healthy intestinal bacteria help keep the fat off

Healthy intestinal bacteria help keep the fat off

     Each one of us has about two pounds of bacteria in our intestines and they are essential to health. These healthy bacteria number in the tens of trillions, with some estimates as large as one-hundred trillion living in our gut. Healthy bacteria also reside on our skin, in our mouth, in a woman’s milk ducts and vaginal region, and according to the most recent evidence, in our urinary tract; once considered sterile.
Having the wrong bacteria dominant in the intestines is dangerous and also not good for digestion and regularity. Research shows that having good probiotic bacteria (their technical name) actually helps you keep excess pounds of fat off.
When you consume fruits and vegetables, they are loaded with fiber. Probiotic bacteria ferment these fibers and release acetate. Acetate is an appetite regulating molecule. Once released acetate travels to the brain where it produces a signal to tell us to stop eating. The research was performed at Imperial College London and the Medical Research Council and is published in Nature Communications