On September 20, 2023, the Netherlands Organisation for Applied Scientific Research (TNO) will host a symposium to celebrate the end of 38 years of Jan Willem van der Kamp at TNO and for highlighting the importance of beneficial synergistic effects of combinations of fibres and of interactions between fibres and other co-passengers.
The event will take place from 1 – 5PM at the Naturalis Biodiversity Centre in Leiden and may be preceded by an optional morning visit to the new TNO Leiden facilities next to Naturalis.
The keynote lecture will be delivered by Bruce Hamaker, Distinguished Professor of Food Science at Purdue University (USA).
Diets high in whole grains, fruit, vegetables, other plant-based foods and dietary fibre are recommended worldwide. Trends towards more plant-based foods, alternatives for meat and dairy and reduction of the levels of sugars and fats in foods are expected to result in a higher intake of a wide range of fibres.
Since health benefits of fibres are increasingly associated with their impact on a diverse and healthy gut microbiome, these developments offer new opportunities for optimising food and fibre composition for enhancing microbial and general health. Recent studies indicate the importance of beneficial synergistic effects of combinations of fibres, of interactions between fibres, polyphenols and other co-passengers.
The symposium will highlight these developments with examples of recent results of published and new studies – including those of TNO’s “No Guts No Glory“ project and personalised nutrition studies – and will discuss ways for further exploring this complex and challenging field both regarding design of studies and priority areas of microbial and general health to be addressed.
Biodiverse high fibre diets are connected to a rich and biodiverse gut microbiome, no dysbiosis and a substantial risk reduction for both metabolic and infection diseases. Since such diets are far remoted from current food intake, finding, and optimising beneficial combinations of fibres and other bioactive compounds packed in attractive products may deliver important benefits for personal and public health.
Confirmed speakers:
- Bruce Hamaker and Cantu Jungles – Whistler Center for Carbohydrate Research, Purdue University:
- Alignment of dietary fibres with gut bacteria for robust and predicted response
- Stefano Renzetti – Wageningen Food & Biobased Research
- From a universal sugar replacement strategy towards unlocking the power of fibre-rich by-products
- Frank Schuren – TNO
- Targeted microbiome modulation through dietary fibres: a new chapter in precision nutrition
- Suzan Wopereis – TNO
- You are what you wheat. Impact of whole wheat and fibres on health – and innovative ways for testing health effects
- Jan Willem van der Kamp – TNO
- Dietary fibres and copassengers – perspectives for 2050
Abstracts:
Bruce Hamaker and Cantu Jungles | Alignment of dietary fibres with gut bacteria for robust and predicted response
The idea of aligning fibre structures for preferential support of either individual gut-resident probiotic bacteria or bacterial groups comes from observations of low and high specificity of fibre chemical and physical structures to gut microbiota function. Such matching of fibres to gut bacteria holds the promise of a robust and predictable fibre response that is consistent for population benefit. Examples will be given for individual fibres identified to promote specific beneficial bacteria as well as mixtures of fibres that support key core groups of gut bacteria, and clinical trial results of the latter. Similar fibre structure-function relationships affect rate and location of fermentation in the colon, and work will also be presented on ways to delay fermentation.
Stefano Renzetti | From a universal sugar replacement strategy towards unlocking the power of fibre-rich by-products
Recently, our group has defined a universal sugar replacement strategy based on physical chemical principles. The strategy is centred on the hypothesis that the plasticizing and hygroscopic properties of sugars has to be mimicked to obtain similar texture in sugar replaced foods. This strategy has been validated for biscuits and cakes, using measurements of both physical and sensorial attributes. However, ongoing research is showing the broader applicability of the principles to other product categories. Using the strategy, multiple blends of commercial ingredients can be optimally designed, leaving room for further fine tuning towards e.g. dietary fibre content.
In this contribution, we first discuss the physical-chemical principles behind the sugar replacement strategy, and its validation for biscuits and cakes by demonstrating the relations with food structure and sensory. Subsequently, we show the extension of these physical-chemical principles to cell wall materials such as (mixtures of) arabinoxylans and xylo-oligosaccharides. Finally, we show the potential towards more holistic approaches to design nutrient-dense products like bakery and snacks with desired sensory properties. Overall, the approach here presented shows potential for promoting a more flexible use of fibre-rich by-products as highly functional ingredients.
Frank Schuren | Targeted microbiome modulation through dietary fibres: a new chapter in precision nutrition
Improving health and preventing disease is now an important aspect of healthcare. Dietary fibres are generally considered healthy and to function, amongst others, via the gut microbiome. Although positive effects of increased fibre intake on human health are described, it has also become clear that not every fibre is effective for every individual (and its gut microbiome). To further improve health effects a better alignment of choosing the right fibres for a specific individual is highly needed. We have shown that short-term in vitro exposure of individual microbiome samples to selected fibres is predictive for longer-term in vivo effect and that depending on the selected fibre(s), the differences between individuals are large or small. Application of these new insights in precision nutrition will be discussed.
Suzan Wopereis | You are what you wheat. Impact of whole wheat and fibres on health – and innovative ways for testing health effects
Food and nutrition including whole wheat and fibres have subtle and long-term health effects via a myriad of underlying mechanisms which is difficult to accurately quantify especially within a healthy population of free living persons, who will not always comply to the intervention of interest and who have a large degree of interindividual variation. Therefore, innovative methodology referred to as ‘phenotypic flexibility’ was developed that may be more sensitive in detecting health effects from food and nutrition as well as in the quantification of human variability, allowing for the development of more personalized nutrition strategies. Within this lecture multiple examples will be shown of how this innovative methodology for testing health effects was applied to show the impact of whole wheat and fibres on health from a one-size-fits-all as well as from a personalized approach and you will test yourself how wheat you are!
Additional abstracts and information about registration to follow soon.
