Most of us understand the importance of gut health for both ourselves and our pets. The intestinal barrier within your dogs digestive system acts as as literally that- a barrier to stop unwanted food particles and microbes from passing from the digestive tract into the bloodstream where they can cause real problems. There is really only one thing that is regulating this barrier and it is a protein known as zonulin. When everything is in balance there are no issues. But what happens when there is too much zonulin?? Let’s take a look today at how this relates to autoimmune disease so stay tuned for more.
So let’s understand today more about this special protein and how it can be beneficial or problematic when it comes to gut, immune and general health. The intestinal lining in your dogs gut acts as a selective barrier, allowing the absorption of nutrients and preventing the entry of harmful substances from the gut into their bloodstream. Within this lining or barrier there are what are known as tight junctions that help keep the barrier from allowing in the wrong things. To help regulate this, there is really only one main substance found with your dogs body that does this and it is a protein known as Zonulin. Zonulin helps regulate the opening and closing of these tight junctions that are found in the intestinal barrier lining. Under normal circumstances, zonulin is produced and released in small amounts, helping to maintain the integrity of this intestinal barrier. However, increased levels of zonulin can disrupt the tight junctions, leading to increased permeability or what is known as leaky gut syndrome which many of you known I refer to all the time. This increased permeability can allow substances like toxins, bacteria, and undigested food particles into the bloodstream, potentially triggering an immune response and inflammation. When zonulin and these tight junctions are not working properly together, it makes it very difficult for your dogs immune system to recognise what is normal and what is not and therefore this can lead to confusion within the immune system where it can start to identify what is normal tissue within the body as foreign and can produce antibodies against these. This is where many autoimmune issues can trigger as the immune system essentially attacks itself. This might be anywhere in the body including the bowel, thyroid, skin, joints etc. With any autoimmune and inflammatory disease, you will find that the there are high levels of this protein So too much zonulin is definitely not a good thing.
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