Postbiotics
Your gut bacteria are dead — and that might be exactly what your body needed.
Grounded in the research on postbiotics
Know what you're eating
Postbiotics are not probiotics. They're the byproducts — metabolites, cell wall fragments, short-chain fatty acids, enzymes — that gut microbes produce or leave behind when they die. You don't need live bacteria to get the benefit. Inactivated whole bacteria (inanimate microorganisms) count too. The International Scientific Association for Probiotics and Prebiotics formally defined the term in 2021 to cut through the marketing fog.
Follow the butyrate science
The most studied postbiotic is butyrate, a short-chain fatty acid produced when Firmicutes ferment dietary fiber. It's the primary fuel source for colonocytes (your colon lining cells), reinforces tight junction proteins to close the gut barrier, and suppresses NF-κB-driven inflammation. Sonnenburg's lab at Stanford and Pedersen's work in Copenhagen both point to SCFA production as a core reason fiber-rich diets cut systemic inflammation markers.