Journal of Nutraceuticals and Health

Probiotics and Prebiotics

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Probiotics are good bacteria that boost gut health, while prebiotics are fibres that nourish these helpful bacteria. They play a key role in keeping a balanced gut microbiome, which is essential for digestion absorbing nutrients, and immune system function. You can find probiotics in foods that have gone through fermentation such as yogurt and kefir. Prebiotics, on the other hand, are in foods like garlic, onions, and bananas. Eating both can improve your digestive health, give your immune system a lift, and might even have a positive effect on your mental state.

Food-fermenting bacteria called lactic acid bacteria (LAB) can increase the nutritional content of the foods they live in and stop food from spoiling. Because of its low cost and energy needs, acid fermentation (together with salting) continues to be one of the most practical methods of preserving fresh vegetables, cereal gruels, and milk-cereal combinations.

Vegetables like pickled vegetables, kimchi, pao cai, and sauerkraut, as well as bread-like products made without wheat or rye flour, sourdough bread, or bread-like products made without wheat or rye flour, and meat-flavored sauces and pastes made by fermenting cereals and legumes, as well as fermented meats and cereal-fish-shrimp mixtures, are examples of fermented products that contain lactic acid bacteria. Other products include dairy products like yogurt, kefir, buttermilk, and non-dairy items like bee pollen.

Complex gut microbiota management can result in interactions between microorganisms and their hosts. Even though probiotics are thought to be harmless, some people are worried about their safety in specific situations. Certain individuals may be more susceptible to negative outcomes, including those with immunodeficiency, short bowel syndrome, central venous catheters, heart valve problems, and premature neonates. 

Probiotics use by children who already have a compromised immune system or who are extremely unwell may cause bacteremia or fungemia.

Prebiotics are substances found in food that promote the growth or activity of good bacteria and fungus. In terms of their impact on human health, prebiotics are most frequently found in the gastrointestinal system, where they can change the makeup of the organisms that make up the gut microbiome.

Dietary prebiotics are usually indigestible fibers that go through the upper gastrointestinal system undigested and serve as substrates for beneficial bacteria in the colon, promoting their development or activity. Marcel Roberfroid was the first to identify and name them in 1995. They might be subject to regulatory scrutiny as food additives for the health claims made for marketing purposes, depending on the jurisdiction. Beta-glucan from oats, resistant starch from grains and beans, and inulin from chicory root are examples of common prebiotics utilized in food manufacture.

Human breast milk, which includes oligosaccharides structurally identical to galactooligosaccharides, is an endogenous source of prebiotics in humans. It has been discovered that human milk oligosaccharides boost the Bifidobacteria bacterial population in breastfed newborns and fortify their immune systems. Additionally, oligosaccharides included in human milk aid in the establishment of a healthy composition of gut microbiota in neonates. Dietary fiber can be categorized as fermentable fiber, which includes indigestible carbohydrate molecules known as prebiotics. However, not every type of dietary fiber falls within the category of prebiotics.