Prebiotics, Synbiotics and resistant starch. Ian L. Brown1, MasaruYotsuzuka2, Anne Birkett3 & AndersHenriksson4 1Faculty of Health and Behavioural Sciences, Universityof Wollongong
2National Starch Food Innovation, Nippon NSC Ltd.
3National Starch Food Innovation, National Starch andChemical Company
4Research and Development Department, DSM FoodSpecialties Resistant starches (RS) have been shown to have awide variety of physiological benefits. Many of these positiveeffects arise from the fermentation of the RS by the colonicmicroflora. It has been observed that RS acts as a prebiotic bypromoting the growth and beneficial activity of specific species ofcolonic bacteria while reducing the numbers of pathogenicmicro-organisms. The use of RS is effective in stimulating theindigenous microflora to assist in the treatment of conditions suchas bacterially induced diarrhoea and ulcerative colitis.
Although probiotics have often been linked with improving thehealth of the host, experimental results concerning their efficacyhave been inconsistent. It has been suggested that synbiotics, acombination of prebiotic and probiotic, would be useful inimproving the reproducibility of the beneficial results obtainedfrom probiotics. RS offers the opportunity of providing targetedsynbiotics. In this case the RS has multiple functionalitiesthrough assisting in the protection of the viability of theprobiotic during its passage through the upper gastrointestinaltract and then in helping to induce the desired specificphysiological effect in the colon. The preparation of a targetedsynbiotic, incorporating a Bifidobacteria lactis and a RS from highamylose maize that is specifically fermented by this bacterialstrain, has been shown to significantly increase the apoptoticindex (a positive biomarker) in a colorectal cancer rat mode]. Thediversity of forms and types of RS offer the opportunity to preparetargeted synbiotics using selected probiotics to improve colonichealth and/or treat various diseases that occur in the largebowel.
Key words: Resistanl starch, prebiotic, probiotic, synbiotic,health benefits |
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