Kickas.org Forums Treatments, Drugs and Alternatives NSD and diet-related; Preserves and immunity

My thoughts on vegetables have been mainly as organic sources of minerals, vitamins and enzymes rather than bulk or energy so quality and freshness is critical. However, good preserving/transformation techniques are an alternative...
I have promoted sauerkraut and kefir before as i find it difficult to swallow a pill full of ten billion bacteria as if it was natural and effective. Maybe it is, i don't know, but many supplements could be money better spent on quality food. Probiotics are vital, all fermented and preserved food interest me as base materials are transformed into something more easily digestible (just like sprouting). All preserving can make suitable food for stores on board for cruising and the fact that the "good" bacteria in our gut are the same ones that preserve food for our consumption is more than coincidence. Acidopholus eat sugar-like organics and produce acids which preserve the food by excluding many anerobic bugs and especially the ones harmful to us. No surprise that olives are preserved in a similar manner and that vinegar preserving is just by-passing the bugs....
Salt helps to select the good species too.
Today i learnt something new that has other connections for this process. I was researching some of the gum and thickeners when i found this about Xantham gum (E415) which is named after the bacteria that is used to mass-produce it.....
It is naturally produced to stick the bacteria to the leaves of cabbage-like plants

Now why would a plant want to stick bacteria to its leaves?
Probably, so it can select the species that live there so they are not harmful or predatory and the plant can use their presence to ward off all the other bugs that would wish to come in and eat of the flesh of the plant. In other words it is a vital part of the plants immune system.
Reminds me of the dusty mold layer on vine grapes which is probably to stop other more aggressive yeasts from getting at all that fructose.

All makes me feel safer about eating E415 and also Gellan Gum E418 which has similar manufacture. Just need to take the "E" book to the supermarket each time...
So here's to eating the best veggies available and growing a good protective layer on my gut to keep out the nasties...

Ted

Close, but not quite!
In fact maybe the opposite.
Apparently the sticking of bacteria to the leaves via gum referred to the predator bacterium and not the plant itself!
In which case, these sticky gums may cause exactly what we don't need - attachment of bugs to our villi and GIT. This needs more definition because the D-mannose and cranberry juice connection is to prevent bugs from sticking to urinary tract lining. Probably exactly what our mucosa does in the gut if prostaglandin activity is healthy (ie we avoid NSAIDs).
I suppose this makes sense as the unwanted elements of gluten and sticky protein is that a glue is formed on the gut which encourages bacterial adhesion and growth. Kp only seems to use its polysaccharide for protection - not for adhesion.
However, the correlation of healthy bacteria on the surface of plants and healthy bacteria on the surface, nooks and crannies of our GIT is still relevant and i'm happy to eat living colonies of acidopholus on fermented foods to assist that. Maybe i'll just examine the way Xanthamonas spp stick to cabbages as i cannot see inside my gut! The clues would be what helps to wash it off and what helps to prevent it from sticking in the first place.
I'll keep you posted - i'm sure you're on the edge of your seats...

Ted

Hey Ted... what d'you reckon to the concept of the good guys being blasted by stomach acids... and what d'you reckon to the idea of kefir enemas (retained) as a mode of overcoming this potential loss?

This is really interesting because I think healing the intestinal mucosa is key. But I'm just starting to learn.....what is an E book ? Are there any foods or substances that have this E415? Can you tell me a little more about them?

Edited by JoanO on 10/29/03 04:00 PM (server time).

Hey Sue, considering all acidopholus sp and other friendly spp withstand and produce acids or SCFAs i think the stomach is one of our selective mechanisms mainly against the bad guys - usually anerobes. Sure, it is very, very acidic, but some bugs do get through OK - i pointed that out once in a thread on oral sex and STD. Worth noting that salt (NaCl) also selects for the good guys and against the bad guys while the acid of the stomach is hydrochloric acid (HCl). It is one thing to say that bacteria cannot withstand a pure acid - pH of 2 - and another to say that all bacteria cannot survive in a stomach soup of fibre and chemicals where the pH is 2...
Are all probiotics sold as enteric coated?
I have more faith and appetite for some of the good bugs finding there way down the GIT rather than up it - but if it works the other way then it certainly adds value to a rectal flush - also a great use for kefir as it would avoid the dairy (casein) issue for me!
I'm personally more inclined to occasional epsom salt or sea-salt gastric flushes. May be a market there for enteric coated capsules...


Ted

"I think healing the intestinal mucosa is key"

Joan you have it all there in one line. The mucosa is our first line of defense and a major digestive mechanism. This is exactly why many of us are here in LSD/NSD because we know NSAIDs harm the mucosa and worsen our condition.
The GIT is where it all starts and finishes - if we don't help it we can get Crohns and IBD etc.
Learning how to help heal it is the journey and even if we don't do any of the other stuff to repair cartilige and other damage, we will get some benefit by eating well and choosing to fast and repair tissue.
Who was it said that "we will be healthy when we have a healthy bowel" ?
(meaning of course the entire gastro-intestinal tract)
By "E-book" i mean the book of food additives.
E415/8 are gums used as thickener/emulsifiers and viscosity regulators.
E418 (gellan gum) helps mimic that "melt in the mouth" taste/texture


Ted

Phew..thanks Ted...that's good news as I personally find it easier to take my kefir top down rather than bottom up.

Are you saying then that we need to make sure kefir consumption is away from food consumption...ie on an empty stomach? Interesting... with Kombucha they say to cover ourselves by taking some before a meal and some after.

Happy kefiring whichever way you see it
Sue

Are you saying then that we need to make sure kefir consumption is away from food consumption...ie on an empty stomach?
No, just pointing at the difference between a test tube filled with homogenous clear liquid to a mix of solids and suspensions and different conecentrations and micro environments in the stomach. Bacteria will have different survival characteristics in each medium.

Ted

Hey ted,
Just thought I would add this journal . In the rodent model of AS they showed that probiotics are certainly beneficial and even preventative of disease.

cheers
z

Medical abstract follows:
=========================================================

Title: Mechanisms of bacterial-induced colitis in HLA-B27 rats

Abstract: DESCRIPTION (provided by applicant) rodent models of chronic intestinal inflammation have contributed substantially to our knowledge of the pathogenesis of IBD. One better characterized model is HLA-B27 transgenic rats, in which the overexpression of the gene for the MHC class 1 molecule HLA-B27 leads to the spontaneous development of colitis, gastroduodenitis, peripheral arthritis and spondylitis. Our hypothesis is that chronic colitis and gastritis is the result of an overly aggressive immune response to luminal bacteria in a genetically susceptible host. This T lymphocyte-dominated immune response to specific luminal bacteria is regulated by antigen presenting cells (APC). This hypothesis is evaluated in HLA-B27 transgenic rats, which develop progressive colitis, gastritis and arthritis when raised in specific pathogen-free environment or when colonized with Bacteroides vulgatus, but which have no clinical or histological disease when raised in a sterile environment or monoassociated with E. coli. In the first 2 years of the K08 award (DK 02551) we studied the role of inducing and protective intestinal organisms in our model. In specific-pathogen-free conditions (SPF) we found that oral broad spectrum antibiotics can prevent and treat established colitis in SPF B27 TG rats, which will recur after the treatment is stopped. Lactobacillus casei GG (L.GG) can prevent the disease recurrence after treatment with antibiotics. However, the immunological mechanisms determining how these bacteria prevent a chronic immune response need to be elucidated. In this R03 application we will address the following specific aims: 1. Determine in-vivo immune mechanisms by which Lactobacillus GG can prevent relapse of colitis in SPF HLA-B27 TG rats treated with antibiotics. 2. Investigate if protective immune responses are mediated by L.GG-specific inhibitory T lymphocytes.

Institution: UNIVERSITY OF NORTH CAROLINA CHAPEL HILL
CHAPEL HILL, NC 27514
http://www.med.unc.edu/wrkunits/1dean/research/dieleman22.html


"So long and thanks for all the fish" - Hitch Hikers Guide To The Galaxy

That's interesting Zark...
back to the old 'breaking of habits' concept... habits of the cells... once a 'strange attractor' has had some influence.
Hmm... maybe it's simply down to vibrational disentrainment...need to do some research and thinking!
Thanks for all the

Sue