Genetic variations within the SI gene affect sucrose consumption and choice, with the potential for focused therapies to curb sucrose consumption and enhance metabolic health.
The examine presents new genetic insights into dietary preferences and suggests the potential to goal SI as a way to selectively lower sucrose consumption on a inhabitants scale.
The examine was led by Dr. Peter Aldiss, now a bunch chief within the School of Medicine on the University of Nottingham, alongside Assistant Professor Mette Okay Andersen, on the Novo Nordisk Foundation Centre for Basic Metabolic Research in Copenhagen and Professor Mauro D’Amato at CIC bioGUNE in Spain and LUM University in Italy. It additionally includes scientists internationally from Copenhagen, Greenland, Italy, and Spain as a part of the ‘Sucrase-isomaltase working group’.
The Role of Excess Sugar in Health Challenges
Dr Aldiss mentioned: “Excess energy from sugar are a longtime contributor to weight problems and kind 2 diabetes. In the UK, we eat 9-12% of our dietary consumption from free sugars, similar to sucrose, with 79% of the inhabitants consuming up to three sugary snacks a day. At the identical time, genetic defects in sucrose digestion have been related to irritable bowel syndrome, a typical practical dysfunction affecting up to 10% of the inhabitants.
“Now, our study suggests that genetic variation in our ability to digest dietary sucrose may impact not only how much sucrose we eat, but how much we like sugary foods.”
The staff of consultants started by investigating the dietary behaviors in mice missing the SI gene. Here, mice developed a speedy discount in sucrose consumption, and choice. This was confirmed in two giant population-based cohorts involving 6,000 people in Greenland and 134,766 within the UK BioBank.
The staff took a nutrigenetics method to perceive how genetic variation within the SI gene impacts sucrose consumption and choice in people. Strikingly, people with an entire incapability to digest dietary sucrose in Greenland consumed considerably much less sucrose-rich meals while people with a faulty, partially practical SI gene within the UK, favored sucrose-rich meals much less.
Implications for Public Health and Therapeutics
“These findings suggest that genetic variation in our ability to digest dietary sucrose can influence our intake, and preference, for sucrose-rich foods whilst opening up the possibility of targeting SI to selectively reduce sucrose intake at the population level,” says Dr Aldiss.
“In the future, understanding how defects in the SI gene act to reduce the intake, and preference, of dietary sucrose will facilitate the development of novel therapeutics to help curb population-wide sucrose intake to improve digestive and metabolic health.”
Reference: “Sucrase isomaltase dysfunction reduces sucrose intake in mice and humans” by Peter Aldiss, Leire Torices, Stina Ramne, Marit Eika Jørgensen, Mauro D’Amato and Mette Okay. Andersen, 13 November 2024, Gastroenterology.
DOI: 10.1053/j.gastro.2024.10.040
