Beer consumption may boost gut microbiota diversity in men
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Drinking one bottle of nonalcoholic or alcoholic beer daily for 4 weeks may lead to more diverse gut microbiota in men, without significantly changing body weight, BMI or cardiometabolic biomarkers, according to new research.
“Decreased bacterial diversity has been associated with diabetes and cardiovascular disease,” Cláudia Marques, PhD, of NOVA Medical School in Lisbon, Portugal, and colleagues wrote in the Journal of Agricultural and Food Chemistry. “Therefore, promoting changes in the gut microbiota to correct dysbiosis and increase bacterial diversity may mediate the effects of successful dietary interventions in the prevention of these chronic diseases.”
Seeking to assess the effect of beer with and without alcohol on cardiometabolic markers and gut microbiota composition, Marques and colleagues conducted a double-blind, two-arm parallel trial and randomized 22 healthy male volunteers (mean age, 35 years) to drink lager beer with either 0% or 5.2% alcohol daily for 4 weeks.
The primary outcome was change in intestinal microbiota from baseline, and secondary outcomes included changes in BMI, total body fat mass, homeostasis model assessment-insulin resistance (HOMA-IR), fasting serum total cholesterol, fasting serum HDL cholesterol, fasting serum LDL cholesterol and fasting serum triglycerides.
Researchers collected blood and fecal samples and conducted body composition evaluations at baseline and after 4 weeks. They used Shannon’s diversity index to measure alpha diversity in microbiome data, which included species richness and evenness within samples.
According to study results, both nonalcoholic and alcoholic beer increased the bacterial diversity in the gut microbiome from 2.7 ± 0.3 to 2.9 ± 0.3 (P = .037) and from 2.8 ± 0.2 to 3 ± 0.2 (P = .021), respectively.
“Alcohol consumption has been shown to decrease bacterial diversity, however, in our study the consumption of alcoholic beer increased gut bacterial diversity,” the authors wrote. “Thus, beer polyphenols seem to have surpass the deleterious effect of alcohol on the gut microbiome.”
Fecal alkaline phosphatase activity also increased after consumption of nonalcoholic and alcoholic beer, from 156 ± 116 to 230 ± 114 nmol/min/mg protein (P = .051) and from 183 ± 216 to 429 ± 227 nmol/min/mg protein (P = .051), respectively.
Consumption of either beer did not increase body weight or body fat mass, nor did it affect serum cardiometabolic markers, including glucose, HbA1c, insulin and cholesterol, the researchers reported.
In a related press release, the American Chemical Society stated: “Based on this pilot study, the researchers say that consuming one bottle of beer, regardless of its alcohol content, may be beneficial to the gut microbiome and intestinal health of men. However, they add that because the safest level of alcohol consumption is none, nonalcoholic beer may be the more healthful choice.”
Reference:
- Lager beer, whether it contains alcohol or not, could help men’s gut microbes. https://www.newswise.com/articles/lager-beer-whether-it-contains-alcohol-or-not-could-help-men-s-gut-microbes?sc=cwhr&xy=10007702/?ad2f=1&aid=772628. Published June 10, 2022. Accessed June 22, 2022.
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In this prospective, randomized, double-blind controlled trial, Marques and colleagues tested the effects of one lager beer (5.2% alcohol) or one nonalcoholic beer consumed daily for 4 weeks on the composition and diversity of the gut microbiome, as well as on cardiometabolic risk factors, in healthy men. Study results showed both beer types increased participants’ gut microbiome alpha-diversity, a measure of intraindividual evenness or richness in gut microbe composition, but had no effect on beta-diversity, a measure of interindividual gut microbe dissimilarity. The beers did not impact body weight, body composition or cardiometabolic risk factors.
Chronic alcohol overconsumption is well-known to have negative health consequences, leading to organ injury as well as disruption in the gut microbiome composition and function. Earlier this year, a study in JAMA Network Open noted that low alcohol intake may also cause health problems. The impact of alcohol consumption on health, as well as underlying mechanisms, continues to be studied in order to be better understood.
The data of this study suggest that the beneficial effects of moderate alcohol consumption may lie within the gut microbiome, and it’s not the alcohol that is providing the benefits, but rather what is produced and contained in the “alcoholic” beverage during the fermentation process. For centuries, food fermentation has been a means to preserve foods, but it hasn’t been until recently that fermented foods are gaining interest into their potential health-promoting benefits.
During the fermentation process the original, organic carbohydrate-containing material (e.g., malted barley grains in beer, grapes in wine, milk in yogurt, sweet tea in kombucha) serves as a “food source” for the added yeast and/or bacterial culture. As these cultures metabolize these carbohydrates, they produce a “new” product that now also contains other metabolic byproducts, or metabolites. Research is growing regarding how these organic acid metabolites (e.g., polyphenols, short-chain fatty acids) may promote health by modulating our immunity and inflammation.
Studies such as this one deserve further investigation to elucidate and confirm whether potential beneficial effects are due to the resultant metabolites. However, as with anything, caution is needed until results can be further validated, as the saying “more is not better” certainly applies to consumption of alcoholic beverages.
Reference:
- Biddinger KJ, et al. JAMA Netw Open. 2022;doi:10.1001/jamanetworkopen.2022.3849.
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Marques C, et al. J Agric Food Chem. 2022;doi:10.1021/acs.jafc.2c00587.
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