Positively Impacts Gut Health

From Chocolate, gut microbiota, and human health
Frontiers in Pharmacology 7 Feb 2013. A peer-reviewed general commentary article by Nabil Hayek of University of Ottawa, Canada based on Functional interactions between the gut microbiota and host metabolism by Tremaroli, V., and Bäckhed, F. (2012). Nature 489, 242–249.

• "Ingredients in diets that are derived from prebiotics and consumed as probiotics or synbiotics play a role in changing the human gut microbiota (Steer et al., 2000). Chocolate or cocoa is considered a prebiotic that is rich, among other chemicals, in polyphenols (Redovniković et al., 2009)."
• "In a controlled, double-blind, randomized clinical trial, researchers compared the outcomes of consuming a high-cocoa vs. a low-cocoa flavanol drinks (Tzounis et al., 2011). Their results show a significant increase in certain gut microbes such as Bifidobacteria and Lactobacilli."
• "In all these studies, IBS subjects had lower numbers of Bifidobacteria, Lactobacilli, and a higher number of Clostridia. The potential effect of chocolate, therefore, as shown in Tzounis et al. could be evident in this case since it led to the increase in the Bifidobacteria and Lactobacilli population and a reduction in Clostridia."

Equivalent Serving Size: specific dose recommendations were not referenced this article.