TMAO: What We We Eat And What's Eating Us

Is it time to add dietary fish to the list of potential causes of coronary heart and kidney disease based on new research findings (http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/27377678)? Tri-methyl amine oxide or TMAO is a newly described compound that our bodies produce and that has created a whole new field of understanding the diet-heart and the diet-kidney hypothesis. TMAO is produced by intestinal bacteria as a result of our dietary choices and the composition of our gut bacteria or microbiome. Work at the Cleveland Clinic has shown that TMAO increased the accumulation of cholesterol in the wall of arteries to begin plaque buildup (http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/23563705). The researchers also demonstrated that it was the bacteria in the GI tract that were producing TMAO (http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/23563705). Finally, TMAO has been shown to be associated with chronic kidney disease (http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/26751065). Until now, the focus on dietary sources of TMAO production has been mainly on foods rich in choline and l-carnitine such as eggs and red meat (http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/24944063). In fact, large research studies have recently identified an association between dietary phosphatidylcholine intake (think eggs, liver and pork) with both Type 2 diabetes (http://care.diabetesjournals.org/content/38/2/e13) and all-cause and cardiovascular mortality (http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/27281307). What's brand-new in TMAO research that m...
Source: Healthy Living - The Huffington Post - Category: Consumer Health News Source Type: news