**8. Conclusions**

As has been discussed in this chapter, multiple factors influence the development of obesity, including diet, a sedentary lifestyle, selection and an inadequate intake of nutrients such as simple carbohydrates and saturated fats. It has also been observed that obese individuals and those of a normal weight have different compositions of gut microbiota, with some bacterial families more predominate than others, which in turn modulates an individual's energy balance in some way and promotes the development of obesity. It has been established that a dietary supply of prebiotics and probiotics, for which there is scientific evidence demonstrating their benefits, could serve as an additional tool to curb the rising trend of obesity in the population.

However, more studies using randomised, double-blind, controlled trials are necessary to demonstrate the efficacy of prebiotics and probiotics for the prevention or treatment of overweight and obesity.

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**Author details**

Sede Concepción, Chile

provided the original work is properly cited.

Silvana Cisternas León\*, Paula Carrasco Vergara, Alejandra Cruz Neira, Ricardo Muñoz Maldonado, Carolina Díaz Araneda and Marcia Rivas Zuñiga

© 2019 The Author(s). Licensee IntechOpen. This chapter is distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/ by/3.0), which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium,

Escuela de Salud, Universidad Tecnológica de Chile, INACAP,

\*Address all correspondence to: silvana.cisternas@inacapmail.cl

*Gut Microbiota and Obesity: Prebiotic and Probiotic Effects*

This work team is made up by academics from the Nutrition and Dietetics Department at the Technological University of Chile, INACAP, Concepción

The work team declares that it has no conflict of interest of any kind.

*DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.5772/intechopen.86672*

**Acknowledgements**

**Conflict of interest**

Talcahuano.
