Slowly digestible starch to combat lifestyle diseases

NWO Green has awarded EUR 250,000 to Prof. Marc van der Maarel of the Engineering and Technology Institute Groningen (ENTEG) for his research proposal ‘Highly branched starches’.

Too much glucose
Starch is the main energy source of our body. Starchy foods such as potatoes, pasta, rice and bread are the basis of our daily diet. In many composite food products such as vanilla custard starch and starch derived products are used to provide texture. All these forms of starch are broken down in the small intestines to glucose. Glucose is absorbed in the blood and serves as an energy source for our body. Modified starch usually is very rapidly converted to glucose in the small intestine. This results into (too) high blood glucose levels that eventually may lead to an imbalance in the insulin level, and to additional fat storage.

Lifestyle diseases
After years of frequent high blood glucose levels people tend to develop obesity and type 2 diabetes later in life. Also young children who consume too much fast digestible starches and sugars, increasingly develop type 2 diabetes at an early age. The impact of these lifestyle diseases contribute to the ever-rising cost of health care. The researchers working on this research project wish to combat these lifestyle diseases by developing slowly digestible starches that provide desired texture to foods.

NWO Green
The research in the programme Green touches upon major societal issues in the areas of food security, raw materials supply, climate change, food safety and the finite supply of fossil fuels.

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