Roughing
Up Cells
MCG scientists have discovered that roughage helps keep you regular by roughing up cells as they make their way down the gastrointestinal tract.
“High-fiber foods bang up against the cells lining the gastrointestinal tract, rupturing their outer covering. This banging and tearing increases the level of lubricating mucus. It’s a good thing,” said Dr. Paul L. McNeil, an MCG cell biologist and corresponding author on the study published in the September edition of PloS Biology.
It was already known that roughage increases mucus production and, years ago, Dr. McNeil discovered that eating causes frequent cell injury and repair. The new research ties the two together.
“An injury at the cell level can promote health of the GI tract as a whole,” said Dr. McNeil. Epithelial cells, which usually live less than a week, are regularly bombarded as food passes by. But in what he and colleague Dr. Katsuya Miyake view as an adaptive response, most of these cells rapidly repair damage and, in the process, excrete even more mucus, which eases food down the GI tract.
Their findings resulted when they developed a way to blast small holes in cells, mimicking what happens in a living animal. “It allowed us to assess whether they could reseal and repair the damage and whether they responded by secreting mucus as part of the healing process,” Dr. McNeil said.
They found time and again that most cells did just that.
The research was funded by NASA.