Authors: Claire Greenhill
Summary:
Supplementing the diets of rodents and humans with fermentable carbohydrates can reduce appetite and body weight gain; however, the mechanisms underlying this action were not known. Now, a new paper suggests that the effect of these carbohydrates is dependent on free fatty acid receptor 2 (FFAR2).
When the gut microbiota ferments non-digestible carbohydrates, they produce short-chain fatty acids (SCFAs) such as acetate and propionate, which signal via FFAR2. “We hypothesized the mechanism by which fermentable carbohydrates protect against diet-induced obesity.
Source:
Nature Reviews Endocrinology; 2016