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The U.S. Army Institute of Environmental Medicine is looking for volunteers (PDF) to eat military food rations for 21 consecutive days for a study of the impact of Meals, Ready-to-Eat, or MREs, on gut health. Researchers want to learn how MREs influence the millions of bacteria in troops' digestive systems. "Interactions between the millions of bacteria living in our gut and what we eat is a very important factor in gut health, but we don't know how MRE foods interact with those bacteria to impact gut health," Holly McClung, a research dietitian working on the project, said on the Army's...

What makes some people slender and others full-figured? Besides diet and genetics, the community of microbes that lives inside us may be partially responsible. New research on twins suggests that lean people harbor bacteria that their obese counterparts don't have. And, given the chance, those bacteria may be able to prevent weight gain. But don’t dig your skinny jeans out of the closet just yet. So far, the work has been done only in mice. What's more, the bacterial takeover requires a healthy, high-fiber diet to work, illustrating the complex relationship between diet, microbes, metabolism, and health. Our intestines are...

Enlarge Image At risk. Changes in gut flora could help explain why obese mice are more likely to develop liver tumors (inset). Credit: Eiji Hara/Japanese Foundation for Cancer Research Why does obesity raise the risk of developing cancer? A new study suggests that the wrong mix of gut bacteria could be to blame. Researchers report that obese mice carry altered communities of intestinal bugs, which produce DNA-damaging acid that leave the mice more susceptible to liver cancer. The findings hint that bacteria help drive cancer development and may eventually help scientists better predict and prevent the disease. Obesity increases...

Enlarge Image Counting calories. Our bodies may take more energy to process the carbohydrates in garbanzo beans than in cereal, which suggests all carbohydrate calories are not alike. Credit: iStockphoto/Thinkstock BOSTON—When it comes to weight loss, a calorie is a calorie is a calorie. That's been the mantra of nutritionists, dietitians, and food regulators in the United States and Europe for more than a century. But when it comes to comparing raw food with cooked food, or beans with breakfast cereals, that thinking may be incorrect. That was the consensus of a panel of researchers who listed the many...