Is Resistant Starch Diet = SCD? A variation?
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anne_likes_red
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I haven't heard of a "resistant starch diet", but no they're most likely not related....ie: the SCD avoids foods containing resistant starch as well as certain sugars and carbohydrates.
what is "resistant starch"?
anne_likes_red
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From the first post in the BIG Resistant Starch thread...
"......And then there is Resistant Starch, which isn't a fiber and is harder to come by in the diet. It is totally undigestible by the gut, but it goes to your colon and feeds your microbiota — it's a prebiotic that is often overlooked because of its indigestibility. There are 3 different types of naturally occurring Resistant Starch (RS1, RS2, RS3) — and each play a role in feeding our microbiota. Most people already have plenty of RS1 — it's only found in found in seeds or legumes and unprocessed whole grains. RS3 isn't a challenge to obtain — it's formed when starch-containing foods are cooked and cooled for 24 hours, such as in legumes, cooked-and-chilled potatoes, pasta salad or sushi rice. The process of cooking starch and cooling it is called "retrogradation". Re-heating these foods converts some of the retrogradation back into starch, so eating them cold preserves the RS3.
However, RS2 is actually quite difficult to obtain in the modern diet, as it is only found in raw potatoes, green bananas, and green plantains (green plantains are virtually impossible to eat raw unless you dehydrate them).
Up until a 9 months ago, Resistant Starch — particularly RS2 — was considered nothing more than a curiosity and a waste of time. Scientists have known that certain raw starches were completely undigestible for centuries — and the conventional wisdom was to avoid them because they had no nutritional value. But it was only in the past few decades that a few researchers discovered that Resistant Starch has some beneficial prebiotic effects on the human gut and the body."
"......And then there is Resistant Starch, which isn't a fiber and is harder to come by in the diet. It is totally undigestible by the gut, but it goes to your colon and feeds your microbiota — it's a prebiotic that is often overlooked because of its indigestibility. There are 3 different types of naturally occurring Resistant Starch (RS1, RS2, RS3) — and each play a role in feeding our microbiota. Most people already have plenty of RS1 — it's only found in found in seeds or legumes and unprocessed whole grains. RS3 isn't a challenge to obtain — it's formed when starch-containing foods are cooked and cooled for 24 hours, such as in legumes, cooked-and-chilled potatoes, pasta salad or sushi rice. The process of cooking starch and cooling it is called "retrogradation". Re-heating these foods converts some of the retrogradation back into starch, so eating them cold preserves the RS3.
However, RS2 is actually quite difficult to obtain in the modern diet, as it is only found in raw potatoes, green bananas, and green plantains (green plantains are virtually impossible to eat raw unless you dehydrate them).
Up until a 9 months ago, Resistant Starch — particularly RS2 — was considered nothing more than a curiosity and a waste of time. Scientists have known that certain raw starches were completely undigestible for centuries — and the conventional wisdom was to avoid them because they had no nutritional value. But it was only in the past few decades that a few researchers discovered that Resistant Starch has some beneficial prebiotic effects on the human gut and the body."
So, is the idea to eat alot of the resistant starches to optimize your microbiome?
JPV
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It's a bit more nuanced than that. It's probably best not to take a lot at first but to titrate the until you find an optimal daily dose. Potato starch is the most commonly recommended form of resistant starch but some people seem to do better on other types like green bananas.
The Resistant Starch thread on the forum is very long and overwhelming. Here are a couple of more concise resources that you may want to start with. You can then browse the thread on this site for more details if you're so inclined...
A Gut Microbiome, Soil-Based Probiotic, and Resistant Starch Primer For Newbies (Fee the Animal)
Resistant Starch – a concise guide to the biohack of the decade (Gestalt Reality)
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JPV
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It should, theoretically, be able to help with the ailments that you listed. But as you already seem to be aware of, from personal experience, probiotics and prebotics can be tricky to use. I think resistant starch feeds bifido which then produces butyrate, so it may not be the right choice for you. Then again, maybe butyrate is one of those things that some people tolerate better by using precursors instead of direct supplementation... I'm not really sure.
Hopefully someone else will come along that can help better explain if this is something that would work for your specific situation.
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Bifidobacteria do not produce butyrate btw. Bifidos are a cog in the wheel of butyrate production in a complex ecosystem where the lactate and acetate they produce is consumed by other species (particularly Clostridial clusters IV and XIVa) which do produce butyrate.
Resistant starch first feeds Ruminococcus bromii, which appears to be a keystone species that first breaks down resistant starch into fragments, so that a wider variety of bacteria can ferment it. Bifido does increase, but only if Ruminococcus is also present. Ruminococcus does produce butyrate, but the health effects go far beyond one SCFA or one strain of bacteria. Animal studies are showing that more than 200 genes are turned on or off in the large intestine from resistant starch fermentation. Some of those genes help control digestive function, i.e., muscular contractions in the colon, but some of them are related to metabolism, i.e., GLP-1 and PYY and insulin sensitivity. There's actually a lot going on in the intestinal soup, and researchers are creating new types of super computer analyses to try to figure it out.
The newest one was a diet swap between African Americans living in Pittburgh and South Africans just published in Nature Communications. This paper makes my head spin with its analysis and graphics! The African Americans ate 39 grams of resistant starch/day (matching the traditional South African consumption) and had significant reductions of mucosal inflammation in the colon cells and colon cancer biomarkers as well as major shifts in the microbiome.
100% agree with JPV that you should start with lower levels of RS and build up, especially if you've got a microbial imbalance or intestinal issues. Most of the studies (like 70+ human clinical studies) are with RS2 from high amylose corn known as Hi-maize. Very few studies have been done in populations with intestinal diseases, although some groups in Australia are beginning to look at it. It's expected to be really complicated because there are so many different variations of microbial imbalances and intestinal disease manifestations. I've seen only one abstract presented at a scientific meeting that fed RS to individuals with intestinal dysfunction, but the full paper isn't yet published. If you want to see the full list of RS clinicals, see http://www.resistantstarch.us/clinical-research-summary/resistant-starch-clinical-list/. Be prepared, there are 111 of them!
The newest one was a diet swap between African Americans living in Pittburgh and South Africans just published in Nature Communications. This paper makes my head spin with its analysis and graphics! The African Americans ate 39 grams of resistant starch/day (matching the traditional South African consumption) and had significant reductions of mucosal inflammation in the colon cells and colon cancer biomarkers as well as major shifts in the microbiome.
100% agree with JPV that you should start with lower levels of RS and build up, especially if you've got a microbial imbalance or intestinal issues. Most of the studies (like 70+ human clinical studies) are with RS2 from high amylose corn known as Hi-maize. Very few studies have been done in populations with intestinal diseases, although some groups in Australia are beginning to look at it. It's expected to be really complicated because there are so many different variations of microbial imbalances and intestinal disease manifestations. I've seen only one abstract presented at a scientific meeting that fed RS to individuals with intestinal dysfunction, but the full paper isn't yet published. If you want to see the full list of RS clinicals, see http://www.resistantstarch.us/clinical-research-summary/resistant-starch-clinical-list/. Be prepared, there are 111 of them!