For example, researchers put people on a diet of meat, eggs, and cheese, giving them 70 percent of their calories from fat and the rest from protein, with almost no fiber.15 Within a day, they had more Bacteroidetes, which are tolerant of bile, a secretion involved in fat digestion. At the same time, the Firmicutes, which digest plant starches, went down. A whole-grain, vegetarian diet had the opposite effects. These changes are similar to differences between meat-eating and plant-eating species. When the participants resumed their regular eating habits, their gut bacteria returned to normal
...more
