Comment by plaidfuji | Hacker News Reader

Comment by plaidfuji | Hacker News Reader

It's good to see this research getting publicity. The comments about economics here are spot on. Fungi are, as far as I’ve seen, the most efficient organisms at converting carbon and nitrogen into protein. And they’re able to handle a wide variety of carbon sources.. in fact this is part of why they produce so much protein - they need to secrete enzymes (proteins) to break down basically all forms of organic matter.. polysaccharides, fats, proteins.. this is literally their job in the world.

Filamentous fungi (featured here) are even more interesting. The filaments are called hyphae, and you can think of them as microtubules for nutrient scavenging. Some filamentous fungi can grow hyphae and penetrate them into the exoskeletons of insects. Hyphae are almost pure fiber and protein, in about a 50/50 ratio. One of the most complete nutritional sources in a single organism. Combined with the fact you can grow them at scale in industrial fermentation processes, they have the potential to be the most economical source of protein in the world.

> most complete nutritional sources

Fat is missing though, and there is no essential need for fiber.

And what about vitamines? Water-soluble and fat-soluble vitamines? The latter of which are probably totally missing. All of those are found in good meat, however.

Fat can be added, as well as vitamin supplementation

> there is no essential need for fiber

Thinking of food only on its nutritional aspects is reductive

From a health point of view, fiber is a necessity

Thinking of food only on its nutritional aspects is reductive

The comment is literally regarding its nutritional aspect. "One of the most complete nutritional sources".

> Thinking of food only on its nutritional aspects is reductive

A reductive approach seems to be the problem of artificial meat, in the first place.

> From a health point of view, fiber is a necessity

If there is a healthy microbiome to digest the fiber, you may want to feed that microbiome with fiber so it stays alive, and even improve the population that way. And I see that fiber can mitigate blood sugar spikes. However, fiber also takes up valuable minerals, prohibiting their uptake. I do not think that the situation is as clear cut as you present it.

Fiber is essential fuel for all kinds of microbes that produce immune-modulating molecules and neurotransmitter precursors for us.

>However, fiber also takes up valuable minerals, prohibiting their uptake. I do not think that the situation is as clear cut as you present it.

If this were actually a concern, it would be beneficial to extract all nutrients from whole foods and consume them as a pill (vitamin) instead of eating our nutrition. This has not borne out in extensive research despite billions of dollars invested into developing and marketing nutrient supplements.

"no essential need for fiber"

Completely wrong.

Fiber is critical.

I know it is a social norm on HN to provide links. But come on, you can just search and find a hundred studies. At some point, just go read them.

In general, I agree that most literature recommends to maintain fiber in the diet. However, this depends and there is research on diets that reduce dietary fiber. Let me refer you to recent articles

in Cell Host & Microbe: https://www.cell.com/cell-host-microbe/abstract/S1931-3128(2...

> we found that a fiber-free diet ameliorates colitis by altering the intestinal localization of a specific gut pathobiont that is required to trigger CD-like disease in genetically susceptible mice. Mechanistically, fiber-free diet inhibited the ability of mucin-degrading microbes to supply critical molecules that are required for the metabolism and maintenance of the disease-causing pathobiont in the mucus layer.

or in Gastroenterology: https://www.gastrojournal.org/article/S0016-5085(23)05306-4/...

> Fiber free exclusive enteral nutrition (EEN) is an effective steroid-sparing treatment used to induce clinical remission in children with Crohn’s disease (CD).

I hope it becomes apparent that having fiber is not the solution to everything. Above papers administer fiber-free diets for treatment.

Other diets focus on the exclusion of certain fibers, like for example, in the widespread and clinically approved FODMAP diet. Hence, it also depends on the type of fiber.

There is a big difference between saying "fiber is not the solution to everything" which I never said, and what the OP said which was to recommend no fiber at all, 0%.

You are citing studies on specific narrow medical conditions where a limiting of fiber had some impact. Yes, you can probably find narrow medical conditions that would benefit from any diet you want to support. You can find medical conditions that support 100% fat, 100% carb, 100% protein. Those are niche cases with specific needs.

That isn't what the general regular human would need.

This is like saying, "we've found that in some specific cases, excess water leads to drowning, thus we recommend a water free diet."

Maybe not you. But it is really awful how many people are really eating unhealthily based on this kind of miss-interpretations, and in some cases out right marketing manipulation.

Yes it is a huge field, and there are a lot of different types of fibers, with hundreds of knock on effects. This is one of those fields where there a lot of variables, it is complex, so super easy to purposely confuse people. To then say, we don't need it?

https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC9511151/

https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/29566200/

https://academic.oup.com/nutritionreviews/advance-article/do...

https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S026156142...

One that is balanced on Pro/Con in different situations

https://www.mdpi.com/2072-6643/14/13/2641

https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S000291652...

Your first two examples are for severely abnormal GI function. The latter of the two, EEN, is also a short-term diet that is intended to induce remission of symptoms, at which point presumably whole foods are reintroduced.

Finally, the low FODMAP diet is not intended to eliminate FODMAPs nor is it intended to be used long term. From the inventors of the low FODMAP diet:

"Given the adverse changes in gut microbial populations associated with long-term adherence to a low FODMAP diet, we always encourage people to enter a re-challenge phase and under the guidance of a dietitian, find an acceptable balance between the occasional inclusion of moderate and high FODMAP foods (naturally rich in healthy prebiotics) and adequate symptom control. In the long-term, we advocate people follow the least restrictive diet necessary. Further research into the rechallenge and long-term maintenance phases of the diet is warranted."

https://www.monashfodmap.com/blog/low-fodmap-diet-provides-b...

How do we kill hyphae so that they don’t continue doing that penetrating thing after we eat them?

Cooking.

Also humans already consume many varieties of fungi without needing to cook them. [0] The human digestive-process and immune-system are actually pretty dang successful at erasing would-be colonizers. (We mainly notice the failures.)

Even the dangerous fungi are typically that way because of posthumous revenge-poison stocked up in their tissues, which is not a feature anybody should be permitting in their production process anyway.

[0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Edible_mushroom

Off topic question, what happen to hyphae when they meet? do they fuse? do they knot around eachother?

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