“The stress-protective potential of consuming dietary prebiotics extends to environmental stressors resembling altered gravity, and, doubtlessly, spaceflight,” wrote researchers from the College of Colorado Boulder and Loma Linda College.
Altered gravity throughout spaceflight negatively impacts the intestine microbiome, immunity, pink blood cells and lung perform. Earlier research point out that spaceflight alters markers resembling pink blood cell distribution width, a medical measure to evaluate potential illness states. Nonetheless, the present researchers famous that much less is thought concerning the particular results on the microbiome.
Proof means that dietary prebiotics might attenuate the antagonistic results of sleep deprivation, traumatic stress and psychosocial stressors. Subsequently, the researchers aimed to discover the potential of prebiotic supplementation within the environmentally traumatic state of affairs of spaceflight and hypergravity publicity.
The findings indicated optimistic results in mice uncovered to hypergravity, main the researchers to recommend that “optimizing a stress-protective intestine microbial neighborhood, each earlier than and through spaceflight exploration, might mitigate the unfavorable results of stress publicity, together with altered gravity, on the intestine microbial neighborhood construction and host well being.”
Examine particulars
The researchers studied 40 feminine mice as a result of NASA primarily sends feminine mice into area attributable to weight constraints throughout spaceflight.
The mice consumed a management weight loss plan or a prebiotic weight loss plan containing galactooligosaccharides (GOS) and polydextrose (PDX) for 4 weeks earlier than being uncovered to 3 instances he gravitational pressure of Earth (3g) for an extra 4 weeks.
The researchers discovered that the prebiotics helped to counteract the dangerous results on the microbiome attributable to altered gravity.
Moreover, the prebiotics diminished the neutrophil-to-lymphocyte (NLR) ratio, a measure of irritation. The examine notes {that a} larger NLR “has been related to mortality, the severity of stroke, post-stroke issues and MS sufferers in relapse.”
Dietary prebiotics additionally elevated pink blood cell distribution width (RDW-CV), a measure to evaluate potential illness states. The examine famous {that a} larger RDW-CV is related to unfavorable well being outcomes, however the mice ranges weren’t in a pathological vary, including that “3g publicity reversed this prebiotic diet-induced improve.”
“Importantly, the prebiotic weight loss plan prevented the impacts of altered-gravity on β-diversity and the bloom of problematic genera, resembling Clostridium_sensu_stricto_1 and Turicibacter,” the researchers wrote, noting that these micro organism are linked to colorectal most cancers.
“These knowledge additional assist that publicity to 3g could be detrimental to parts of the host physiology and that dietary prebiotics symbolize an efficient, environment friendly and low-cost technique of mitigating a number of the antagonistic results of publicity to altered gravity, and presumably spaceflight, on host well being.”
They known as for additional analysis to find out the underlying causes of the noticed results.
Supply: Vitamins 2025, 17(15), 2417. doi: 10.3390/nu17152417. “A Prebiotic Weight loss program Containing Galactooligosaccharides and Polydextrose Attenuates Hypergravity-Induced Disruptions to the Microbiome in Feminine Mice”. Authors: R. S. Thompson et al.
