Intestinal permeability is a term that describes the control of material passing through the gastrointestinal tract to the rest of the body through the cells lining the intestinal wall.
While the gut normally exhibits a degree of permeability that allows nutrients to pass through the gut, it also maintains a barrier function to prevent potentially wasteful matters (such as antigens) from leaving the gut and migrating more widely into the body.
In a healthy gut, small particles can pass through the tight contact claudin pore pathways, and sufficiently large particles can pass through the paracellular space uptake pathway.
Leaky Gut Causes
One possible cause of leaky gut is increased intestinal permeability or intestinal polypermeability. This can happen when the tight contacts in the gut that control what passes through the small intestine don’t work properly. This can cause the elements to leak into the blood circulation.
Dysbiosis, or bacterial imbalance, is a leading cause of leaky gut syndrome. It means an imbalance between the beneficial and harmful bacterial strains in your gastrointestinal tract. Malnutrition includes proteins found in sprouted grains, sugar, genetically modified foods (GMOs), and dairy artifacts.
