Fat, Sugar, and Bone Health: A Complex Relationship

Abstract

With people aging, osteoporosis is expected to increase notably. Nutritional status is a relatively easily-modified risk factor, associated with many chronic diseases, and is involved in obesity, diabetes, and coronary heart disease (CHD), along with osteoporosis. Nutrients, such as fats, sugars, and proteins, play a primary function in bone metabolism and maintaining bone health. In Western nations, diets are generally high in saturated fats, however, currently, the nutritional patterns dominating in China continue to be high in carbohydrates from starch, cereals, and sugars. Moreover, high fat or high sugar (fructose, glucose, or sucrose) impart a significant impact on bone structural integrity. Due to diet being modifiable, demonstrating the effects of nutrition on bone health can provide an approach for osteoporosis prevention. Most researchers have reported that a high-fat diet consumption is associated with bone mineral density (BMD) and, as bone strength diminishes, adverse microstructure changes occur in the cancellous bone compartment, which is involved with lipid metabolism modulation disorder and the alteration of the bone marrow environment, along with an increased inflammatory environment. Some studies, however, demonstrated that a high-fat diet contributes to achieving peak bone mass, along with microstructure, at a younger age. Contrary to these results, others have shown that a high-fructose diet consumption leads to stronger bones with a superior microarchitecture than those with the intake of a high-glucose diet and, at the same time, research indicated that a high-fat diet usually deteriorates cancellous bone parameters, and that the incorporation of fructose into a high-fat diet did not aggravate bone mass loss. High-fat/high-sucrose diets have shown both beneficial and detrimental influences on bone metabolism. Combined, these studies showed that nutrition exerts different effects on bone health. Thus, a better understanding of the regulation between dietary nutrition and bone health might provide a basis for the development of strategies to improve bone health by modifying nutritional components.

Chronic stress and body composition disorders: implications for health and disease

“…Several studies have shown that high fat or high glycemic load diets are associated with decreased bone mineral density; as bone strength diminishes, adverse microstructure and inflammatory changes occur in the cancellous bone compartment, which is involved in both lipid metabolism and the bone marrow microenvironment [90]. In obesity, GLP-1 and other protective gut molecules decrease and the process of osteopenia and/or osteoporosis intensifies progression to osteosarcopenia [91].…”

Shotgun Metagenomics of 361 elderly women reveals gut microbiome change in bone mass loss

“…13 modules with more than 0.99 R square (sTab4, Fig4A) are obtained by the model and plotted in rank by their importance (Fig4B, sTab4). In addition, for the correlation with clinical indexes, the negatively correlated modules like the lactate consumption, sucrose degradation that would impart a significant impact on bone structural integrity [24] and tryptophan degradation which plays a complicated role in osteoblastic differentiation [25] are positively associated with HDL and CROSSL, but negatively with TG. By comparison, the BMD positive modules, for example the pectin degradation that would inhibit bone resorption and strength the bone [26], trehalose degradation which could be effective on the prevention of bone mass loss [27], arginine degradation that can prevent bone mass loss and bone collagen breakdown in rats' model [28], mucin degradation and rhamnose degradation.…”

“…Some targeted modules, like the degradation of pectin [26], trehalose [27] and arginine [28], are related to bone protection. But for the sucrose degradation module, it would impart a significant impact on bone structural integrity [24], which suggest that we should reduce the intake of foods rich in sucrose in our daily diet.…”

3T chemical shift‐encoded MRI: Detection of altered proximal femur marrow adipose tissue composition in glucocorticoid users and validation with magnetic resonance spectroscopy

“…However, such differences would have been reflected into subcutaneous adipose tissues and muscle, which is not the case in our study. [38][39][40] Finally, while promising, for this approach to become more widely used as a research or clinical tool, the CSE and analysis method should be validated at other skeletal sites (eg, vertebral bodies) and within other regions of interest.…”