Recent outbreaks of food-borne diseases highlight the need for reducing bacterial pathogens in foods of animal origin. Animal enteric pathogens are a direct source for food contamination. The ban of antibiotics as growth promoters (AGPs) has been a challenge for animal nutrition increasing the need to find alternative methods to control and prevent pathogenic bacterial colonization. The modulat...

Inulin-based prebiotics are non-digestible polysaccharides that influence the composition of the gut microbiota in infants and children, notably eliciting a bifidogenic effect with high short chain fatty acid levels. Inulin, a generic term that comprises β-(2,1)-linked linear fructans, is typically isolated from the chicory plant root, and derivatives such as oligofructose and long chain inulin...

UNLABELLED Studies have shown fibers to be effective in reducing the appearance of aberrant crypt foci (ACF) in rodents. OBJECTIVE The goal of this study was to investigate the preventive effects of fructooligosaccharide (FOS) and inulin prebiotics on the appearance of ACF in mice. MATERIALS AND METHODS The techniques used were: RT-PCR to evaluate the gene expression of p16, p21, p54, cycli...

The gastrointestinal tract is subjected to enormous and continual foreign antigenic stimuli from food and microbes. This organ must integrate complex interactions among diet, external pathogens, and local immunological and non-immunological processes. It is critical that protective immune responses are made to potential pathogens, while hypersensitivity reactions to dietary antigens are minimis...

Over past years, a dairy product called probiotic yogurt has been manufactured known as a functional food. In order to increase activity and improve growth and survival of probiotics and to improve technological properties of probiotic yogurt, prebiotics are added to its formulation. The aim of this study was to evaluate the effect of prebiotics (lactulose and inulin individually, and as mixtur...

The resistant carbohydrates, inulin, and Fibersol-2, belong to soluble dietary fibers and are considered important prebiotics that maintain biological functions, including glucose homeostasis, lipid regulation, colon disease prevention, and prebiotics characteristics. However, few studies have investigated Fibersol-2 alone or in combination with inulin to assess a pooled effect on modulation of...

We conducted a meta-analysis to evaluate the effects of probiotics and prebiotics on the immune response to influenza vaccination in adults. We conducted a literature search of Pubmed, Embase, the Cochrane Library, the Cumulative Index to Nursing and Allied Health (CINAHL), Airiti Library, and PerioPath Index to Taiwan Periodical Literature in Taiwan. Databases were searched from inception to J...

The main role of diet is to provide nutrients to meet host physiological requirements. As research behind diet and health has evolved, so has the concept of ‘functional foods’ become popular. Foods which are touted as being ‘functional’ are thought to exert certain positive properties over and above their normal nutritional value. While not universally popular and sometimes plagued by inadequat...

Over the past few decades there has been a significant increase in the prevalence of obesity in both children and adults. Obesity is a disease that has reached epidemic levels on a global scale. The development of obesity is associated with both environmental and genetic factors. Recent studies indicate that intestinal microorganisms play an important function in maintaining normal body weight....

Probiotics are beneficial microbes that confer a realistic health benefit on the host, which in combination with prebiotics, (indigestible dietary fibre/carbohydrate), also confer a health benefit on the host via products resulting from anaerobic fermentation. There is a growing body of evidence documenting the immune-modulatory ability of probiotic bacteria, it is therefore reasonable to sugge...