The good, the bad, and the ugly of food processing! Nutrient density and the relationships between food production systems, human health, and the health of our microbiome with Anneline Padayachee, University of Queensland

High tech production systems can produce highly nutrient dense foods. Food processing is a technology, it’s an enabler. It’s the formulations that are usually the conundrum.  

Every component in food has an important role to play. There are thousands of biologically active compounds above and beyond the few dozen essential nutrients, vitamins, and minerals. These all work together to impact our health. We are only starting to scratch the surface on understanding how these all work together. A huge part of this is the interconnections between our heath and our microbiome. Whenever we eat, we are feeding both ourselves and our microbiome.   

Dr Anneline Padayachee is a nutrition scientist at the University of Queensland who has been studying the relationships between the nutrient density of our diets, our farming systems, our health, and the health of our microbiome.  Her work focuses on not just understanding these relationships but also linking the cultural, emotional, and political aspects of what we eat to human behaviour.

The role of nutrient density in our food has been ignored for centuries. The first three food revolutions, from the ancient Egyptians to the Industrial revolution and the green revolution of the mid 20th century all focused on providing cheap and abundant food made from ever cheaper ingredients. This has resulted in the massive acceleration of in chronic health diseases such as diabetes, cholesterol, and heart disease. We are now entering food revolution 4.0 which is nutrition and health innovation where health must be the focus of product development. Nutrient density in food is absolutely essential. This is irrespective of whether the foods are eaten straight off farm or processed using emerging technologies. 

I recently caught up with Anneline to hear more about her work. You can listen to his conversation here. 

Transcript

AS

Anneline thank you so very much for joining me today.

AP

Thank you for having me ash.

AS

So there's a lot of talk nowadays about processed foods, especially Ultra processed foods, the potential health benefits potential environmental benefits. Can you just start with a bit of background in terms of food processing the good the bad, the ugly?

AP

Yeah, yeah. So food processing does get a lot of bad rap in the media and some of the, you know, there's a lot of justifiable reasons as well. But how we got here is very important to consider to begin with. So when we look at the iterations of the food revolutions over history, the first one was the agricultural revolution with the ancient Egyptians, and how they actually started planting crops on the banks. of the river. So they have a stable water supply and they can grow mass crops, because up until that time, it was very much so based on seasonality and whatever we grew, we added that that little time we started and trying to get through to the next wet season so they had a city water supply, they could grow crops almost all year round. And that is what actually helped the population to grow. Not saying it was nutrient dense at all, because a lot of ancient Egyptians died in their early 40s. But at least they had a stable food supply the entire year. So that's better than going through periods of famine or food insecurity. And that type of new way of farming kind of spread for eons of years, and it was the way that the food supply was viewed, just in terms of having stability and no food insecurity until the 1700s when the food when the industrial revolution started happening. And so now we've got machinery being used to create food. We've got Louis Pasteur and his team, you know, discovering microbes. And so the technologies that we were using things like drying retorting canning, any sort of heat treatment, pasteurization was very much so fixated on destroying microbes that were being discovered, and preserving shelf life to get you know, we're talking about an era where people didn't have refrigeration. They didn't really understand food safety. That much either. And nutrition was still not really well established as a science. So that was the driver. Nutrition as the science is only about 220 years old. So we're very young, you know, discovering what a vitamin is and those sort of things. And so, way back when nutrition was, as a science was discovered, the whole aim was trying to work out what causes micronutrient deficiency, so if I don't have vitamin C what's the disease I will get scurvy, my teeth fall out this words give this stop the sailors lemons. If we didn't have iron, you've got a disease called anemia. That's kind of where the mindset was. But at the same time, we have this you know, industrial revolution type mentality to the food world. By the 1950s. However, things started changing again for the food world. And that was when automation started entering. So the car sector was automating they were mass producing cars, it was not so much individuals on the bench line. And so the food industry copied that because now they could get more food products out. And in one sense, it's a good thing because you can get more food products and you decrease the cost so it becomes more available to people. I think President Hoover in his actual present well before he became a president in his campaign, one of his aims was a chicken in a pot for everyone and a car in everyone's garage. So trying to mass produce food was a big thing back then, just to make it more affordable. And so that was the mentality, like let's decrease costs. Everyone can afford it if we if everyone can afford it, and we're trying to like equalize everyone decrease poverty, but at the same time, the role of nutrient density in food wasn't taken into consideration. So now we've got heaps and heaps and heaps of cheap products out there. And of course, they end up with these cheap products here also manufactured cheap ingredients, where nutrient density is not necessarily taken into consideration. Plus we also still thinking food safety. So now we've got all these products flooding, the market, TV meals, snack products, you know, chips, lollies, all those sorts of things. And then we're seeing this high increase in chronic health diseases that we never had before like diabetes and cholesterol and heart disease.

Unknown 4:44

And so that's kind of you know, that's been the main driver in the food industry. And, you know, that's evolved. And we've got things like artificial intelligence that is now used to automate decisions. We've got fair trade agreements and globalization and multinational markets that we're working in. So these are all different pressures that the food industry has had to contend with. But the underlying principle of mass production, getting lots of food out there, keeping it safe, so that you don't have food poisoning. And keeping the cost down has been the underlying driver. But now we're entering Food Revolution four point our which is nutrition and health innovation. So doesn't matter what you do whether you make a baby formula or vegan Patty or a new variety of milk or a fermented protein, whatever it is, health has to actually be the crux of that decision that innovation that product development, because we know more. Nutrition is now definitely established as a very cool science. We know that nutrition is not just about weight loss, and body image, but nutrient density and food is absolutely essential. It is the fuel that fuels our bodies. Too much of the good thing can lead to health problems and too little of a good thing can lead to health problems. So how do we create food supplies? Whether it'd be processed or you know, natural, straight or farm in which health is the funneling ethos and that's where we're heading in that direction.

Unknown 6:17

So, where are we in that journey? And I guess it's probably worth doing it a bit deeper to the food or nutrition related diseases and the impacts on our societies at the moment as well.

Unknown 6:33

Yeah, so in terms of where we are in that journey, I think for the first time in history, we're starting to work together the food and the nutrition world for quite a long time nutrition. You know, when nutrition was initially a science way back to 20 years ago, it was a science it had its own category like astronomy, physiology, biology and nutrition was a science alongside chemistry. And then over time, especially into the 1950s Nutrition kind of became this dietetics mode of operation where it was used for disease treatment because people had diabetes or heart disease. Or whatever it was, and the science of nutrients and its role in food architecture or have free to architecture effects nutrients in the food and our digestive tract how we actually absorb it was kind of shelved shell but the direction and the focus on it was a bit lost by 2000. I think 2012 is when we got microbiome officially got organ status. So that's a you know, our newest organ to the human body, gut microbiome, and with its discovery and you know, this is not just some bacteria living down in our colon, but it is an organ, and there's a whole bunch of them and the role of what they do. You know, the role of the colon is no more just about fermenting waste so that it's easy to pass out of our body. But these bacteria ferment whatever we can absorb. And they produce metabolites and those metabolites are absorbed through the colon wall and they go on to cause all sorts of different actions in the body both good, sometimes not so good. So our understanding of the human digestive tract our understanding of bioavailability of nutrients by accessibility of nutrients, so but accessibility is is if we've got nutrients trapped inside of food, like say carotene and carrots, what are the factors that prevent that carotene from being absorbed so the dietary fiber the cell wall, how fast our our enzymes can break things down? Those factors are being researched being discovered, and it's, it's, it's becoming more well known. And so marrying that knowledge with an understanding of nutrients with an understanding of food density, like the actual quality of the food, and that starts all the way on farm. You know, so how we feed that cow or the the fertilizer in the soil, the water supply, or you know, even got fermenters so that really cool high tech ways of producing food. Using microbial fermentation or, you know, the alternative proteins and how they're growing them cell culture and stuff like that, right at that level, where we're producing the food supply. And they needed to take it to the next level and we're processing it, the technologies that are used along that whole spectrum right up until the guests in my mouth are starting to be modified based on our understanding of the human digestive tract and how powerful we are.

Unknown 9:44

So when, just for the Layperson when you buy a product at the supermarket or the grocery store, and you look at the label, and all have fat, salt, sugar, protein fiber, you may have one or two vitamins, or one or two other minerals. But there's a handful of things that if you actually go and dig a bit deeper, I think there's 12 or 13 vitamins and there's a certain similar number of what deemed essential minerals. But as we learn more, how many actual important nutrient molecules are we talking about isn't 10 is 50 is 100 is that 1000 Or we don't know?

Unknown 10:29

No, not 1015 or 20. Every competitor name for it has an important role to play. And some things are considered nutrients and some things are considered non nutrients. So nutrients by default are things that the body it needs to prevent micronutrient deficiencies or micronutrient deficiencies, whatever will prevent a deficiency disease. So for example, if a person doesn't have enough protein, but they've got enough carbohydrates or fat, they can end up with a condition called sarcopenia. In the Western world, it's very common in the elderly because you see the muscle wastage, the hair without protein, and so you can't actually build muscle. You see the same sort of thing in federal countries with those little kids with big bellies, and they've got really skinny arms and skinny legs, whatever it is massive bellies, which is filled with it's filled with gas. And so that condition is called Quest to call. And essentially, they just don't have enough protein. So they're not eating enough calories. They actually are they're eating lots of maize, but they just don't eat enough protein. And Protein is essential to break down carbohydrate. Alright, so that's where the nutrient mentality came from. But now we've got also a whole bunch of compounds called non nutrients because if you don't have them, you won't end up with some sort of deficiency disease things like poly phenols, phytonutrients, anthocyanins, phenolic acids, they play a really important role in supporting the actions of the essential vital nutrients. So they play a really important role in backing those guys up. They do things in the body with like antioxidant activity, anti carcinogenic activity, anti mutagenic activity, so fighting DNA damage, but it's entirely based on dose. So you can just take one, you know, pill of anthocyanins and think it's going to work. It's dose and it's consistency. And so we're understanding that this is all it's new and it's evolving. So whilst they don't have the essential status, like the nutrients guys, they are extremely important. And so foods, nutrients, dirt, nutrients and nutrients don't work in isolation of each other, they actually enhance each other's absorption sometimes they can work to detract absorption as well. So like say vitamin C actually helps with your non ie your your plant derived ion or non heme iron, it enhances your absorption of that. But then we've also got fighter phytates in the in the plant, cell wall and dietary fiber that decreases over absorption. So, understanding how these things work together to both enhance absorption or detract absorption is absolutely essential. And that's and we're still doing a little work in that.

Unknown 13:26

So from a practical point of view, I guess not knowing all this information and I want to eat something that's good and healthy for me and has a mixture of these nutrients and other biologically active molecules. Hell's the best way to approach that? How do you how do you know one that you've got the the right balance of different foods but that your tomato or Apple carrot is actually one that's rich in these nutrients compared to one that's not so rich in these nutrients?

Unknown 14:02

All right. So really simple things that everyone can do. is firstly eat mostly plants. I'm not saying become a vegan or verge vegetarian, but eat mostly plants. So at least half of your plate should be plants. A quarter of your plate should be carbs and a quarter of your plate should be protein rich, whatever that is. And the reason for eat mostly plants is because it's amazing as opposed to dietary fiber. And your gut microbiome doesn't have the privilege of choosing its preferred meal of choice. And dietary fiber is its preferred meal of choice so you got to feed them. So mostly plants. Plants are a great source of a few phytonutrients vitamins, minerals and lots of water right so it bogs you up so we got to eat a lot off it because it's just got so much water and fiber in it. Whole grain carbohydrates, which means that the whole grain is there. It's not been refined. We haven't stripped it off its brand its job, which are really nutrient dense components and protein and that could be your tofu, your eggs, your meat, your steak, chicken, your fish, whatever. So that's like the simple rules. Really simple. The second thing is it lots of color. So when you're looking at your plants, if you've got some green, got some red, got some orange got some purple, got some white you've covered all your bases, you've essentially covered all the essential nutrients and even all the range of different antioxidants and phytonutrients simultaneously. So that's the important thing, and anyone can do that. The next thing to look at is and this this is where it says the effect price range, because we need to actually try to roll out this level of regenerative farming and stuff like that out. Now the research at the moment shows that like say if you do organic farming versus commercial farming in comparison, in terms of total antioxidant capacity, they are still very comparable. But in the long term. The impact of organic farming is definitely better for the soils microbial count. And that will have that eventually lay down to affecting the quality of nutrients. In foods over a long period of time. So my always suggestion is, you know, I would rather people leave food than Behala not getting the nutrients into their body because they're so fixated on I need to have organic or not. So for everybody 50% plants a quarter crap, a whole grain, a quarter protein and mostly plans, any color. And anyone can do that, regardless of their their budget and their socioeconomic status. But if you want to go the next step, and you want to think a bit deeper and you're thinking long term and you also have the affordability to do it one of the best ways to contribute to the sustainability of the planet is to actually think of how these products are raised and grown and produced and making sure that they're the the methods of farming and the methods of production because we do have a lot of Noli novel technologies that are coming through is regenerative and is sustainable. So there is no point in saying I have an organic farm. If we're using three times the amount of water into that organic farm because that equation is out of whack something else is is being lost at the same time on the flip side, you have things like vertical farms, and vertical farms look super high tech. And they you know these these monstrosities of glass buildings that are five storeys high, and you've got five different layers of vegetables growing on a conveyor belt and it doesn't look like your traditional farming system. And yet it can be extremely energy efficient. It can be extremely water efficient. They don't necessarily use pesticides at all because they keep the pesticides out there use Vitalizer because they don't need to the plants grow in a nutrient dense solution. And so that's a high tech system. And yet it actually produces it can produce really nutrient dense foods that have very long sustainability for the food supply and for the planet as well. So we've got to look at things in a really balanced perspective.

Unknown 18:18

There's there's a lot of science in it. And that's awesome information for once again back for for more a layperson. Is there anyone? Is there anyone actually creating labels or creating like the British Red tractor or something else that will help the average consumer know which box to that food is in in terms of the nutrient density? Yeah, so

Unknown 18:47

nutrient density is a relatively new concept. I mean, it's in the science world. We know it but it's a new concept. Definitely in terms of the food industry. And it's a new concept for you and a lot of healthcare professionals. Because not all nutrients are exactly the same not all proteins are the same. Not all cup fibers are the same. Not all carbs are the same. Not all fats are the same and so that's what I mean when I'm saying nutrient density. At the moment, our food labeling largely is based on ingredient decks and on nutrition information panels. So when you send the product off to a lab to test it for its nutrition information pedal there, there are prerequisites and we need to know the total energy we need to know total protein, total carbs and total fat and if you make claims we can split that fat down into saturated, unsaturated and trans and sorry, there is a what's required. If there is a claim we will also test for I have for dietary fiber. But it doesn't actually tell you much. It tells you some it gives you some level of understanding it's better than a completely missed mirror. We've got a slightly clearer mirror here. But it doesn't tell us what that type of protein is. And that's where we've got the conundrum setting tap and especially with the rise of the plant alternatives. And so you've got like say an alternative milk and why Okay, and not milk versus Dairy Milk and dairy milk is just No, it's just one ingredient. And so they do all the research in what's actually in that milk. Whereas the plants ones are actually made, they're formulated so they've got to add you know, 3% of almonds and water and some oil and stabilizes and if they want they can add the vitamins and minerals to it. So because they're adding stuff into that product, they will put that on the nutrition information panel, whereas dairy milk doesn't add anything to it. So it doesn't really go into detail on the NRP and here's the thing, the protein and the almonds for example, or hemp or whatever it is, is actually a different type of protein to what's in dairy milk. In dairy milk, we've got casein, we've got whey and casein actually coagulates in the stomach so it has it makes you feel full for a longer period of time. Which is really great for weight management. And you've got way which is super easy to absorb, it's often useful and design. So it's really great for growing children for growing bodies for bulking up for muscles, those sort of things. So that type of protein is very different to the types of protein you're getting out and nuts. They behave differently in the body. And yet we're not actually putting that information out on packaging yet, just because that level of understanding needs to be translated in a way that the food industry can a do. That labs can test and through the legislation needs to be created. Otherwise, we end up having either well meaning companies or you know cowboys out there that can take advantage and manipulate the system. So once the legislation is in place the legislation is super important to prevent or try and help consumers make informed choices and prevent misinformation from getting out to consumers and that's not yet there. But it is definitely it will definitely be heading in that direction.

Unknown 22:29

Once again, there's a hell of a lot there. So thank you, thank you for all of that. I think that there's there's a lot of innovation going into making new foods and be that the the meat alternatives, you know, there's a lot of growing different things and trying to get textures and a lot of investment innovation is going there. There's also the fact that probably over the last 30 or 40 years, the current mass produced highly processed food market has tended to produce some of the least healthy things on our shelves. So how do you I guess balance that up? Internally and not turn your back on innovation? Because innovation is great, but also make sure you go get taken down the garden path so to speak.

Unknown 23:33

Yeah, yeah. So it's it is challenging ash definitely. This year learn I think I've spoken in about 10 conferences on this exact same topic. Because it because for a long time Nutrition has been seen as probably not. I think nutrition hasn't maintained as a real science for a long time it lost its lost its credibility, and maybe no credibility. It lost its way in the whole weight loss movement had lost its perception, whole weight loss movement. And so for a long time, we didn't actually have nutrition scientists working in the food industry. We got food scientists coming through through technologies great fantastic but people with nutrition expertise, were not actually there and weren't at the table. And now a lot of food companies are realizing hey, we actually need these guys and creating the opportunities in this space for them to be part of the process. And that's a really great thing because we need to be there. Processing in itself is a technology. It's an enabler. It's the formulations that are usually the conundrum. And so, thankfully, we're getting people coming in into the food industry that have that understanding of nutrition as a science, how much of certain nutrients we need in foods that will have a beneficial impact on the human body. But we gotta be also honest, there are products out there like nutrition is the sum total of everything we consume and drink. Okay? So I'm not going to say I'm not going to demonize one particular food product or one particular sector of the supermarket. marshmallows are definitely you know, pretty much just aerated packets of sugar. And there's nothing wrong with eating marshmallows as long as they are not the bulk of your diet. There's nothing wrong with having a glass of red wine as long as again, as long as it doesn't take up 75% of what you should be drinking. You've always gotta have water. You gotta have some, you've got to have that. It's the it's the balanced perspective and balanced perspective balanced. Diet is both 100% accurate, and it's also the most frustrating thing because it doesn't tell anyone more balanced is we leave people on to their own devices and that's not fair either. So the you know, the aim for a healthy diet is the sum total and when you take your step back and you look at your, you know, look at your diet for the whole day. Don't even look at it for the whole week. Just look at it for the whole day. And if it is in lots of packaging, and it doesn't have much dietary fiber, and it doesn't have much color and everything looks fairly similar like a muesli bar looks pretty much the same. Color as a cookie, which looks pretty much the same color as a muffin, which doesn't look very dissimilar to a burger bun. Okay, then we've got we've got a slight problem here and you don't need me to tell you that. So just taking that step back and looking at your food because the more refined it is, the more than nutrition, the nutrients have been stripped out from it. And so that's really important that everyone can keep that in mind. Can you have a course logs? Can you have a pastry or a pie? Yes. But where is that in the whole scheme of your diet? If that's a daily thing, and we've got some issues that we need to look at. Why is that a daily thing? Is it because you lack cooking skills? Is it because your work you're you're a truck driver and you don't actually have the time to pack a meal and you don't know how to pack a meal that last six hours. Is it financial costs. And so it's very simplistic to say you need a salad every day and attended Cina. And yet maybe people don't have the the resources the accessibility. They have they may have allergens or whatever. So you've got to take the person into consideration so what works for me they don't necessarily work for you. While the overall ethos of steak sit back, look at your meal. Look at your daily food intake. Nutrition is the sum total of everything I consume. So if you're doing it right 70% of the time, you're eating mostly plants, lots of color, lots of dietary fiber, supplementing your meals with whole grains, and some good quality lean protein. And the 30% of the time you're having your marshmallows. You're having your crisp, you're having your red wine, you're having a croissant. Well you've you've pretty much nailed it. Oh,

Unknown 28:12

you mentioned that people have different health different actually are we?

 Unknown 0:05Oh, how different are we? Well, personalized nutrition is definitely going to be the next wave. It's one of the next waves coming. The more we know, the more the better we can do. The thing is you don't know what you don't know. But we are knowing more about our genetics and how genetics plays an important role in metabolism of nutrients. Our absorbability you got to think like humans overall Yes, we have very similar needs. We all have a brain we have a stomach we have small intestine, we have a colon. We have arms, legs, and we move in, we walk and we breed. So from that perspective, we have very similar needs. But we also do know and I'll use this as an example. We also do know that there are regions of the world that have lower levels of lactate lactose intolerance, so that body is naturally able to manufacture lactase enzyme. And so people who are of European descent, Australians, people in the UK have the lowest rates of lactose intolerance in the world. I think it's as low as only 5% of the Australian population have. The inability to have the European proportion of the Australian population have the inability to produce lactase and you can get up to about 13% in places like some of the Nordic countries but then you've got into South America and parts of Africa, where it can be between 40 to 50% of those population groups that are unable to produce lactamase, and then you get into Asia and it can be as high as 90% of that population group. That's unable to produce lactase. Now, we're also humans. And we also have arms and legs. We all breathe oxygen and we all move and we still have the same digestive tract. How come in those parts of the world they have more lactase in lactose intolerance versus, say parts of Australia in Europe? So genetics does play a role? Definitely. And we're definitely understanding more about genetics and the role that that takes in nutrient absorption. When a person does nutrition work with me, I always look at all the Bloods and because I want to see a what's in their bloodstream, but I also want to try and understand how their metabolic pathways work. Because your metabolism is going to be different to my not just because you're at a different stage of the lifecycle. You're of a different ethnicity. You're a guy, I'm a girl, you've probably got more lean muscle tissue than I do. But we do realize that yeah, genetics is definitely a role and so personalized nutrition is definitely coming. It's going to help us understand individuals in a greater way. Unknown 2:53And then, Unknown 2:54another interesting study i i saw not so long ago, was looking at the Chilean responses to different foods. And the two foods that we use in Australia were ice cream and sushi. And the trial showed that roughly 50% of the people got the big spike from ice cream, which probably no one would be surprised about. And roughly 50% the other 50% got the big spike not from the aspirin but from sushi. And the researchers concluded that was down to the gut microbiome, which as he said is the latest organ to be added to to our body even though it's been there for millions of years, we just haven't really acknowledged it. But where does because the microbiome is not actually new. It's something that's living inside the body so it does change how fix of that how much of that is diet driven? How much of it is hereditary or environmental or we still don't know the answers to many of those questions. Unknown 4:04Yeah, so the gut microbiome is a complex little, little person who lives inside and we do know that the gut microbiome is affected from in utero. So what your mom eats affects you or your grandmother eats affects you. So that's how far back we can go in terms of genetics, right? So what mom eats affects the baby growing on the inside. Of her. And the best methodology also affects it. So babies who are born by cesarean because it's very sterile, right? You got to think like this is literally an operation where you keep everything super clear and clean. And so those little ones when they come out, they don't have the natural, I guess contamination that happens during vaginal birth going through the vaginal canal, there is microbes that there's bacteria, and so they get contaminated. So this is their first introduction, because in utero, it's absolutely sterile. So when you come out through the birth canal, that's the contamination process. And they're exposed to their mom's bacteria, which is a first way of being exposed whereas kids who have gone through cesarean are not exposed that way. Now, is that is that a beneficial thing? It can how do we do this? I don't want all the moms out there to go oh my gosh, I didn't do anything for my baby. No, no, just just come down. This is just ways in which we get exposed to bacteria. Okay. So a what she eats and secondly, how they're born. And thirdly, even breast milk. So breast milk actually can provide many bodies and stuff like that through breast milk. And that can help to colonize the gut microbiome. But then you've also got bacteria on skin and skin to skin contact causes that as well. Now, unfortunately, and I used to work in infant formula, there's a lot of babies and a lot of moms out there who can't breastfeed for whatever reason. And so now we're seeing great because we realized that this is happening with breast milk, how can we actually make it commercially available? So there's a lot of companies out there that have probiotic drops that you can add to your formula to actually help with that colonization for bone, which is again, brilliant making that possible and speed expatriating that process? So that's your early stage when we're really young. Once you start introducing a kid to solids, that's when the fun starts starts happening because bacteria grow of the substrates are they given and essentially their favorite food is anything fiber, see, value that everything. Anything that is not absorbed in your small intestine, is what they get to eat. So if you are lactose intolerant, using that as an example, you don't have the lactase enzymes to split the lactose molecule up so it's doesn't get absorbed in your small intestine. That's why it ends up in the colon and then these books fermented and produce bloating and the cramps and the diarrhea. That's really uncomfortable. And that's only because it's landed in the colon it hasn't been absorbed. So they only do everything. But just because they can eat everything doesn't mean it's good for them. So different foods that we feed them resistant starch fermentable fibers, soluble fibers, things like that. That actually helps different species to grow, helps population numbers to grow. And that's what's super important. If you're ever on any biotic, well, then yeah, you're gonna destroy the bad bugs in your body that's causing infection, but you will also negatively impact your good bacteria. And so that's why it's recommended that yes, you do take a probiotic at least half an hour or an hour after you've done your antibiotic. It is not going to repopulate your gut microbiome but it's going to strengthen your bugs that are there because they're taking a whack from the antibiotics and they need all the help that they can get. Things like eating fermented foods like yogurt. Now yoga is fascinating because yes, it's got live bacteria in it, but you got to realize the human body is actually pretty hardcore. You've got to get through the stomach, which has got a pH of 1.8. You've got to get through Unknown 8:19six meters of small intestine six meters. That's the size that's the height of an adult male giraffe. So it's intense, and it starts off at about a pH six and it ends up all the way at about a pH five and a half and you've got enzymes hitting you in order for the small intestine. So the bacteria in your gut have to survive. That process. And then you end up in the colon. And you've got about 1.8 meters of colon to work through. And so right at the start, it's about 1.8 pH at 1.8. And by the end, it can get up to about three or four which is not ideal because that's when carcinogens and pathologic bacteria grow. And that's where we see a lot of colon cancers happening down the down the end of the colon. So you want to keep whatever you're getting in that colon being able to reach all the way to the end bacteria so that they can prevent it. That's why fiber is amazing. But you're not going to is amazing because the bacteria seem to be protected in the protein matrix. So they're not easily destroyed by the gut microbiome and by the pH in the stomach. So when you are taking a probiotic, and I tell this to everybody and America is actually really good because you've got quite a few products that do this microencapsulated probiotics are essential. It's one thing to take a probiotic that's got billions and billions and billions of numbers. It's gotta realize it's got to get through the stomach and the stomach is designed to kill things. So microencapsulated means that it's the little bacteria are trapped inside a little teeny tiny sphere. And they can get through this really rigorous process all the way to the colon with about here in Australia we've got a comfortable pre gel and they have microencapsulated delivery through the digestive tract Unknown 10:30Well, there's Unknown 10:34a lot there. One thing you one thing you brought up was, I guess the the physical size and shape of things like whether it's micro encapsulation, or whether it's, you mentioned how things are wrapped up or packaged. l how important is the physical structure of foods, your health and well being Unknown 11:06very important. I mean, yeah, okay. Firstly, I realize we cannot forget we've got this incredible factory inside of our body, and that's called our digestive system. And our digestive system starts in our mouth. So this kind of idea is actually part of the process. So particle size starts up in your mouth, breaking it down, chewing it up. If it is not small enough, you can't get the nutrients out of it. Quite blank, the end. And so that makes it harder for your small intestine to absorb things right to get to chew properly. There is actually some truth in that I will say that up to 12 times 16 times. There's actually a lot of science to back that up. Because the smaller the particle size is it means that your stomach can actually digest it or break it down even further. We're talking about particles on the nano scale. Now we don't eat nano scale anything. Okay? So if you told you about say an apple or carrot, you mean the little cells that are inside there at the Nano scale. So you might be able to see it like in a segment of an orange here you can see those tiny little stacks. That's where nutrients live. But they're gonna get out of that fibrous little pocket. Same sort of thing when you're talking about protein or carbs or, you know, like protein rich foods and things like that. So that we're talking about a very tiny scale. So our digestive system is really important in breaking those cells. Down. Dismantling protein molecule so when you eat a steak or you drink some milk, you know, like thinking about a steak, for example, a piece of fish or even tofu like you're talking about a chunk here. Protein under a microscope actually looks like bowls of wool. That's what it actually looks like. And so the acid in your stomach actually uncoils that bowl of water. We don't see those balls of wool, we just say this chunk of tofu or cheese in uncoils it and then you have specific enzymes that come along and snip it into its amino acids and the amino acids are what is absorbed by our small intestine, crystal ball. So that's why particle size is actually really important to be chew up properly. It is probably a better chance of breaking it down and you give your small intestine a better the ability to absorb more. Okay, so that's firstly really important. When we're talking about processing and processing gets a lot of does get the negative rap, but you have to also look this applications and this is where individuals come into play. As we get older, we do know that we do produce a little bit less stomach acid and so older people in particular, and they're prone to sarcopenia. You'll notice and you've probably noticed with your elderly relatives and friends, they don't want to eat steak. They want stuff proteins, they want chicken they want fish they want eggs because they say it's easy for their teeth and in theory it is actually easier for the team because it's softer. And they also say it's it's I don't feel so full. Also true. So because it's a softer protein, it's easier for their aging digestive system to break down. And here's where some really cool technologies can actually be used to help them out. So there's things like high pressure processing, which is exactly that really, really really high levels of pressure that is applied to say a cheap cut of meat. That's really sinewy and chewy and hard. You put it into a high person purchasing machine. It's just pressure which is putting it into a pressure chamber and it softens all those sinews down. And it makes it like extremely easy to digest in the human body. So you can take something like that cheap, go to mate put in the HPP zap it under some really high pressure just for a couple of minutes and you create something that is excruciatingly tenderize and tastes amazing. It's a great eating experience, but we're creating products for people who have digestive issues that they can actually now eat these types of products. They don't have to eliminate it from their diet. HPP can also be used to preserve product. So same sort of deal I can put milk in HPP instead of pasteurizing it which is heat treatment to destroy pathological bacteria. You can put high pressure processing milk into a high pressure processing tank and Unknown 15:36you save all of the bioactive components you don't destroy any of the beneficial bacteria. So we've got technologies there that actually can enhance nutrition. They can enhance our absorbability especially through different stages of the lifecycle. So the food matrix definitely does play a very, very, very important role. But if you're at overall a generally a healthy person, you know, you're you don't have any diseases. You don't have any ill health. Your bowel motility is working really well. And you're Balotelli I know this is really crazy, but my expertise is understanding proofing. So you shouldn't strain you know, but it's not the end of the toilet, and the time it takes for you to empty your bowels and leave should be no more than five minutes should be that simple. It should look like a sausage and if it does all of that you know that you've got a good bowel motility. And so you're healthy and so your digestive tract can handle quite a lot. Unknown 16:40Wonderful. Is there anything else? There's there's a lot we've covered. Is there anything else you think that we've missed that you would like to add? Unknown 16:51I think one thing I will add is that you know nutrition is the bee's knees and everyone wants to understand more about nutrition which is fantastic. Because like truthfully it is the fuel of the human body. And if you treat your body right, it will take care of you. The human body is extremely resilient, so you want to be treated badly it will try and correct the wrongs that you're doing. But it can only go so far. So it does rely on us to make good choices for it. Your gut microbiome point number two you got microbiome is like a little baby. It's a little person who lives inside your colon. There's millions of them, and they all have personality. They have emotions, they like certain foods as well. So if it's good, if it's healthy for you, it's going to be healthy for them. When marshmallows are a treat for you marshmallows are a treat for them to think of them in that perspective. And the third thing like I think food is both one of the coolest sciences in the world. It is a science because it touches on anatomy. Affects physiology. It affects chemistry, it affects psychology, and how our brain functions and our emotions. It is affected by biology. It is affected by microbiology. It's affected by physics. So it is a really cool science, but because it is easily accessible to everyone we all have to eat in unfortunate unfortunately has lost its specialness its uniqueness, its importance. We give more credibility to rocket scientists than we do to nutrition scientists. Because everybody and it's common, and I can go to the shops and buy whatever I want to eat and that makes me an expert. Unfortunately it doesn't just like building a rocket from LEGO does not make me a rocket scientist. Just because we all eat food does not make us expert in nutrition. And so I think it's super important for consumers to try and make sure you assess the information you get. It has to be from credible information because unfortunately everybody's trying to get onto the nutrition bandwagon and it is causing more problems, especially in the long term. What you do now is setting your body up for tomorrow. It is setting your body up for five years down the track. It is setting your body up for 10 years, 20 years, 30 years down the track, and it also is going to affect your future children. So the thing with preventative health, it's not something we can actually measure because our benchmark is not getting sick. Yeah. So whereas if you've got diabetes, or some sort of chronic disease or anemia, I can put you on a diet and we can give you a whole bunch of supplements. And then we can track how you improve. Whereas prevention is not like that. Okay, we're not trying to stop a sickness that's in your body. We're trying to prevent that from happening. And so if you keep that in mind, what you do now is what your future body is going to thank you for or not thank you for putting things into perspective. So you know, make sure you the information you're getting is from really important, really good, credible sources. And the last point I like to say is supplements are not evil. I know a lot of people think that supplements you know, we should always get over nutrition from food and yeah, at one stage in my life when I was early in my career, I used to be that way as well. And it's true, it is true. If you're eating all the right stuff. And you're eating the variety and you're eating for you. You're for your body. I'm not eating for you and waiting for me. You shouldn't get all your nutrients that's 100% accurate, but the truth is we also live in a busy world. And we've also got external pressures on our lives and we've got, you know, forces and stresses and anxieties and I don't always have time to eat smoking, you know, salmon three times. A week. So taking an Omega three supplement is not a bad thing at all. But if you're gonna take supplements, you got to make sure you take them at at a level that will have a biological response. You have to make sure that you're not going to overdose because that can also cause problems. And you don't just go to the shop and just pick a whole bunch of supplements and just take it for the hell of it. Make sure you see a health care professional and get your blood tested and then they will give you the right thing that you should be taking if you need it. Unknown 21:31Wonderful, thank you so very, very much for for all your insight and knowledge and sharing that with Thank you very much gentlemen. Unknown 21:40Thanks so much for having me. I really enjoyed it.