If the seaweeds nori, kombu, or wakame have long been part of your diet, there’s a good chance your gut bacteria harbor genes from sea life.
Microbiologists have discovered the human gut microbiome has acquired this exotic DNA multiple times during the history of seaweed consumption in Asia.
The first clues that they might came about 10 years ago. Researchers found a cluster of seaweed-digesting genes from a marine bacterium that eats noriTo find out how common those genes were in people, Eric Martens, a microbiologist at the University of Michigan, Ann Arbor, and his colleagues placed human fecal samples on plates containing seaweed extracts.
Next, his postdoc Gabriel Pereira looked for the seaweed-digesting genes in the guts of nearly 2500 people from North and South America, Africa, Europe, and Asia. The researchers found genes for digesting nori in 512 of the 1361 samples from Japanese and Chinese participants, but in very few participants from elsewhere. Those Asian participants were also more likely to have the genes needed to digest other kinds of seaweed.
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