Ángel Gil

University of Granada | UGR · Department of Biochemistry and Molecular Biology II

Context Experimental and observational studies suggest that circulating micronutrients, including vitamin D (VD), may increase COVID-19 risk and its associated outcomes. Mendelian randomization (MR) studies provide valuable insight into the causal relationship between an exposure and disease outcomes. Objectives The aim was to conduct a systematic...

Simple Summary Patients suffering from taste disorders have been unable to find treatments in the pharmaceutical industry. In this study, a novel strategy has been presented to reduce side effects in patients suffering from cancer by administering dried miracle berries (DMBs), which contain the taste-modifying glycoprotein miraculin, as an adjuvant...

Dysgeusia contributes to nutritional derangement and worsens the quality of life of patients with cancer. Despite the different strategies, there is no effective treatment for patients suffering from taste disorders provided by the pharmaceutical industry. We developed a novel strategy for re-ducing side effects in cancer patients by providing a no...

Carcinogenesis is closely related to the expression, maintenance, and stability of DNA. These processes are regulated by one-carbon metabolism (1CM), which involves several vitamins of the complex B (folate, B2, B6, and B12), whereas alcohol disrupts the cycle due to the inhibition of folate activity. The relationship between nutrients related to 1...

Dysgeusia contributes to the derangement of nutritional status in patients with cancer, as well as worsening the quality of life. The pharmaceutical industry has failed to provide effective treatments for patients suffering from taste disorders. The present study provided a novel strategy to reduce side effects in patients with cancer through the a...

Background Adverse early life exposures might negatively affect foetal and infant development, predisposing children to obesity. We aimed to systematically identify and evaluate risk factors for childhood obesity in preconception, pregnancy, and infancy, and assess their potential as targets for future prediction and prevention strategies. Methods...

Background Taste disorders are common in patients with cancer undergoing systemic therapy, persist during treatment and are associated with reduced food intake, increasing the risk of malnutrition. Cachectic syndrome, which is common in these patients and characterized by marked weight loss, anorexia, asthenia and anemia, is linked to the presence...

Taste disorders (TDs) are common among systemically treated cancer patients and negatively impact their nutritional status and quality of life. The novel food approved by the European Commission (EFSA), dried miracle berries (DMB), contains the natural taste-modifying protein miraculin. DMB, also available as a supplement, has emerged as a possible...

Importance: Childhood obesity increases cardiometabolic risk during childhood among individuals aged 2-18 years. These cardiometabolic outcomes include glucose intolerance, dyslipidemia, hypertension, metabolic syndrome, and type 2 diabetes (T2D). In the current state of research, a comprehensive review identifying all early-life exposures and risk...

Children with a history of extrauterine growth restriction (EUGR), later at prepubertal age, exhibit an increased metabolic risk including risen insulin resistance and low-grade inflammation. However, the progression of such metabolic changes after puberty and the lasting health implications have not yet been investigated. The objective of this stu...

Taste disorders (TDs) are common among systemically treated cancer patients and negatively impact their nutritional status and quality of life. A food supplement containing the natural taste-modifying protein miraculin (DMB ® ) has emerged as a possible alternative treatment for TDs. The present study aimed to evaluate the efficacy and safety of ha...

Recent studies have shown that certain nutrients, specific food groups, or general dietary patterns (DPs) can promote health and prevent noncommunicable chronic diseases (NCCDs). Both developed and developing countries experience a high prevalence of NCCDs due to poor lifestyle habits, DPs, and low physical activity levels. This study aims to exami...

Background Methionine-methylation cycle and the derived critical functions during infancy are key regulated by folates, vitamins B12, and B6. At present in Spain, there is an absence of studies that assess the intakes and dietary sources of total folates and B12 by children consuming all types of milks and those regularly consuming adapted milk for...

Taste disorders are common among cancer patients undergoing chemotherapy, with a prevalence ranging from 20% to 86%, persisting throughout treatment. This condition leads to reduced food consumption, increasing the risk of malnutrition. Malnutrition is associated not only with worse treatment efficacy and poor disease prognosis but also with reduce...

Taste disorders are common among cancer patients undergoing chemotherapy, with a prevalence ranging from 20% to 86%, persisting throughout treatment. This condition leads to reduced food consumption, increasing the risk of malnutrition. Malnutrition is associated not only with worse treatment efficacy and poor disease prognosis but also with reduce...

Background Gut bacteria play a crucial role in the metabolism of bile acids (BA). Whether an association exists between the fecal microbiota composition and circulating BA levels in humans is poorly understood. Here, we investigated the relationship between fecal microbiota diversity and composition with plasma levels of BA in young adults. Method...

The World Health Organization recommends exclusive breastfeeding on demand until at least the sixth month of life. Breast milk or infant formula is the infant’s primary food source until the age of one year, followed by the gradual introduction of other foods. During weaning, the intestinal microbiota evolves to a profile close to that of the adult...

Exclusive breastfeeding is highly recommended for infants for at least the first six months of life. However, for some mothers, it may be difficult or even impossible to do so. This can lead to disturbances in the gut microbiota, which in turn may be related to a higher incidence of acute infectious diseases. Here, we aimed to evaluate whether a no...

Objectives To evaluate whether there is an association between the serum levels of the novel insulin-like adipokine isthmin-1 (ISM1) and obesity-related phenotypes in a population of Spanish children and to investigate the plausible molecular alterations behind the alteration of the serum levels of this protein in children with obesity. Methods Th...

Exclusive breastfeeding is recommended for the first six months of life to promote adequate infant growth and development, and to reduce infant morbidity and mortality. However, whenever some mothers are not able to breastfeed their infants, infant formulas mimicking human milk are needed, and the safety and efficacy of each formula should be teste...

Introduction Metabolic syndrome (MetS) is a cluster of clinical and metabolic alterations related to the risk of cardiovascular diseases (CVD). Metabolic changes occurring during puberty, especially in children with overweight and obesity, can influence the risk of developing chronic diseases, especially CVD. Methods Longitudinal study based on th...

Background Puberty is a time of considerable metabolic and hormonal changes associated with a physiological increase in peripheral tissue insulin resistance (IR). There is evidence that physiological IR does not resolve in youth who are obese, which may result in increased cardio-metabolic risk. Understanding the molecular and biological processes...

Introduction The main cause of insulin resistance in childhood is obesity, which contributes to future comorbidities as in adults. Although high-calorie diets and lack of exercise contribute to metabolic disease development, food quality rather than the quantity of macronutrients is more important than food density. The purpose of the present study...

Pre-clinical studies suggest that circulating oxylipins, i.e., the oxidation products of polyunsaturated fatty acids (PUFAs), modulate gut microbiota composition in mice, but there is no information available in humans. Therefore, this study aimed to investigate the relationship between omega-3 and omega-6 derived oxylipins plasma levels and fecal...

Vitamin D (VD) is a fat-soluble vitamin, and pivotal for maintaining health. Several genetic markers have been related to a deficient VD status; these markers could confer an increased risk to develop osteoporosis and other chronic diseases. A VD deficiency could also be a determinant of a severe COVID-19 disease. This study aimed to interrogate ge...

Puberty has been described as a life stage of considerable metabolic risk specially for those with obesity. The low-grade systemic inflammatory status associated with obesity could be one of the connections with metabolic syndrome (MetS). Thus, we aimed to assess the relationship between inflammatory and cardiovascular biomarkers and the developmen...

A variety of mediators participate in the resolution of the inflammatory process, among which are lipoxins, resolvins, protectins and maresins. These mediators mitigate the infiltration of polymorphonuclear leukocytes, decrease the production of pro-inflammatory compounds and stimulate the uptake of apoptotic polymorphonuclear-dependent macrophages...

Background: the evaluation of diet quality (DQ) is fundamental to the study of disease-diet associations, and an easy-to-apply tool in nursing homes (NHs) is necessary. Our objective was to propose a novel diet quality indicator (DQIn) using an a priori approach for NHs. Methods: the QUality Index for Nutrition in Nursing homes (QUINN) was imple...

Intercellular communication is mainly carried out by hormones, neurotransmitters, eicosanoids, growth factors and cytokines. Eicosanoids are chemical mediators with high biological activity, derived from fatty acids of 20 carbon atoms. Among them, prostaglandins, prostacyclins, thromboxanes and leukotrienes stand out. Eicosanoids are involved in th...

Background Breastmilk is the most appropriate food for infants and exclusive breastfeeding is highly recommended for the first six months of life to promote adequate growth and development and lower infant morbidity and mortality. Among the best-documented benefits of breastfeeding is the reduced risk of disease and infections such as pneumonia, di...

Objective: Human brown adipose tissue (BAT) has gained considerable attention as a potential therapeutic target for obesity and its related cardiometabolic diseases; however, whether the gut microbiota might be an efficient stimulus to activate BAT metabolism remains to be ascertained. We aimed to investigate the association of fecal microbiota co...

Minerals and vitamins involved in the antioxidant defense system are essential for healthy growth and proper development during infancy. Milk and dairy products are of particular importance for improving the supply of these nutrients to children. Indeed, the present study aimed to evaluate the nutrient intake and food sources of zinc (Zn), selenium...

Diet is one of the most relevant factors of the exposome affecting the development of chronic diseases. Likewise, nutritional interventions have been proven effective strategies for the management and prevention of such pathological conditions from the beginning of the ages. Nevertheless, there is a marked variation in how humans respond to the sam...

The content, physical state, and health impact of all milk components are reviewed. The chemical composition and physical properties of proteins, caseins, and whey proteins are described. Triacylglycerols constitute the largest group of the lipid fraction, including a large number of esterified fatty acids. In milk, the exclusive presence of short-...

Previous works have described the activity of Bifidobacterium longum subsp. infantis CECT 7210 (also commercially named B. infantis IM-1®) against rotavirus in mice and intestinal pathogens in piglets, as well as its diarrhea-reducing effect on healthy term infants. In the present work, we focused on the intestinal immunomodulatory effects of B. in...

Exercise modulates both brown adipose tissue (BAT) metabolism and white adipose tissue (WAT) browning in murine models. Whether this is true in humans, however, has remained unknown. An unblinded randomized controlled trial (ClinicalTrials.gov ID: NCT02365129) was therefore conducted to study the effects of a 24-week supervised exercise interventio...

Background Enoyl-CoA hydratase short-chain 1 (ECHS1) is a key mitochondrial enzyme that is involved in valine catabolism and fatty acid beta-oxidation. Mutations in the ECHS1 gene lead to enzymatic deficiency, resulting in the accumulation of certain intermediates from the valine catabolism pathway. This disrupts the pyruvate dehydrogenase complex...

Background: Breastmilk is the ideal food for infants and exclusive breastfeeding is recommended. In the clinical trial aimed to evaluate a new starting formula on weight gain of infants up to 6 and 12 months. The novel formula was compared with a standard formula and breastfeeding, the latter being used as the reference method. Methods: 210 infants...

Objectives Brown adipose tissue (BAT) is important in the maintenance of cardiometabolic health in rodents. Recent reports appear to suggest the same in humans, although if this is true remains elusive partly because of the methodological bias that affected previous research. This cross-sectional work reports the relationships of cold-induced BAT v...

Nutrition is a key factor in the development of non-communicable chronic diseases (NCCDs), especially cardiovascular diseases (CVD) and their risk factors. The “double burden of malnutrition” (DBM) is the coexistence of undernutrition and overnutrition in the same population across the life-course. In Latin America, the transition from a predominan...

Pediatric Gastroenterology and Nutrition June 2022 - Volume 74 - Issue S2 - p 1115 doi: 10.1097/MPG.0000000000003446

Pediatric Gastroenterology and Nutrition June 2022 - Volume 74 - Issue S2 - p 1117 doi: 10.1097/MPG.0000000000003446

Objective: To investigate the association of plasma levels of endocannabinoids with fecal microbiota. Methods: Plasma levels of endocannabinoids, anandamide (AEA) and 2-arachidonoylglycerol (2-AG), as well as their eleven analogues, and arachidonic acid (AA), were measured using liquid chromatography-tandem mass spectrometry in 92 young adults....

There is an urgent need to reduce sugar intake in early childhood. Commercial infant cereals are among the first solid foods introduced to infants at the beginning of the complementary feeding period in most countries. The aim of this study was to examine infants’ overall acceptability of low-sugar complementary cereals. To do so, a between-subject...

Background and Aim Changes in adipokines have been related with the development of metabolic syndrome, frequently associated with obesity, and other risk factors. Fitness seems to promote a healthy cardiovascular status and could be a protector factor, just from childhood. Therefore, the present study aimed to evaluate the relationship between fitn...

Currently, in Spain there are no studies assessing the intakes and sources of intrinsic and added sugars by both children consuming standard milks and children regularly consuming adapted milk formulas. Our goal was to evaluate current sugar intake levels (intrinsic and added) and their major dietary sources within the EsNuPI study participants by...

Background The pathogenesis of autism spectrum disorder (ASD) is under investigation and one of the main alterations relates to the metabolic and inflammatory system dysfunctions. Indeed, based on a possible deficit of omega-3 fatty acids (FAs) of patients with ASD and looking for an anti-inflammatory effect, dietary supplements with omega-3 fatty...

Childhood obesity prevention is important to avoid obesity and its comorbidities into adulthood. Although the energy density of food has been considered a main obesogenic factor, a focus on food quality rather that the quantity of the different macronutrients is needed. Therefore, this study investigates the effects of changing the quality of carbo...

Hematopoietic stem cell transplantation (HSCT) involves the infusion of either bone marrow or blood cells preceded by toxic chemotherapy. However, there is little knowledge about the clinical benefits of parenteral nutrition (PN) in patients receiving high-dose chemotherapy during HSCT. We investigated the lipidomic profile of plasma and the target...

Purpose The aims of this study were; 1) to evaluate if there is an association between the serum levels of the novel insulin-like adipokine isthmin-1 (ISM1) and obesity-related phenotypes in a population of Spanish children, 2) to investigate the plausible molecular alterations behind the alteration of the serum levels of this protein in children w...

Nutrition is a key factor in the development of non-communicable chronic diseases (NCCDs), especially cardiovascular diseases (CVD) and their risk factors. The “double burden of malnutrition” (DBM) is the coexistence of undernutrition and overnutrition in the same population across the life-course. In Latin America, the transition from a predominan...

Diet affects microbial colonization and homeostasis of the gastrointestinal tract, influencing health during the lifespan. Western-type diet is related to metabolic disease incidence, increased in both developed and developing nations. Diets with high quantity consumption in fruits, nuts, vegetables, legumes, seeds, and whole grains and low consump...

Vitamin D is involved in bone health by promoting calcium absorption in the gut and maintaining serum calcium and phosphate concentrations, and by its action on bone growth and reorganization through osteoblasts and osteoclasts cells. Moreover, during the last three decades, novel actions of vitamin D have been discovered. Several systematic review...

The intestinal microbiota is a group of bacteria living in the gut in a symbiotic relationship of both commensal and mutualistic types. The gut microbiota acts as a barrier versus detrimental microbes using competition for nutrients and ecological binding site occupancies and antimicrobial substances production. Microbiota composition in the gastro...

A possible strategy to combat obesity is the stimulation of brown adipose tissue (BAT) thermogenesis. This article aims to revise the current knowledge of BAT and its implications for human health to support the development of new strategies for the treatment of obesity and cardiometabolic disease. The discovery of active BAT in humans led to optim...

Introduction: An impaired antioxidant status has been described during foetal growth restriction (FGR). Similarly, the antioxidant defence system can be compromised in preterm children with extrauterine growth restriction (EUGR). The aim of this prospective study was to evaluate the antioxidant status in prepubertal children with a history of prema...

Obesity and cardiometabolic risk have been associated with vitamin D levels even in children. The objective of the present study was to evaluate the association between insulin resistance (IR), cardiometabolic risk factors, and vitamin D in children from prepubertal to pubertal stages. A total of 76 children from the PUBMEP study, aged 4–12 years a...

Childhood obesity has been related to metabolic syndrome and low-grade chronic inflammation. This study aimed to evaluate the impact of physical activity intensities and practice on inflammation, endothelial damage, and cardiometabolic risk factors in children. There were 513 participants, aged 6–14 years, recruited for the study. Physical activity...

Background Physical activity (PA) has acquired a significant relevance due to the health benefits associated with its practice. Accelerometers are an effective tool to assess PA; however, the diversity of cut-off points used to define different PA intensities through accelerometry could interfere in the interpretation of the findings among studies....

Eating behavior problems are characteristic of children with autism spectrum disorders (ASD) with a highly restricted range of food choices, which may pose an associated risk of nutritional problems. Hence, detailed knowledge of the dietary patterns (DPs) and nutrient intakes of ASD patients is necessary to carry out intervention strategies if requ...

Noncommunicable diseases are the main cause of death globally, and most are potentially preventable; they are long term diseases and generally evolve slowly. In Uruguay 64.9% of the population between 25 and 64 years of age are either overweight or obese. The available scientific data show that workplaces are good for developing food-intake interve...

The health-transitions humans have delivered during the 20th Century associated with the nutrition is that from undernutrition to obesity, which perseveres in the current years of the 21st Century. Energy intake (EI) is a contributing factor and therefore a fascination in nutritional sciences. However, energy expenditure (EE) has not been usually c...

Long-chain polyunsaturated fatty acids (LC-PUFAs) are critical for infant growth and development, particularly arachidonic acid (ARA, C20:4n-6) and docosahexaenoic acid (DHA, C22:6n-3). ARA and DHA are components of cell membrane phospholipids and play an important role in cell division, differentiation, and signaling; and DHA is the n-3 fatty acid...