Starch digestion in young infants compared with older babies
What it found
Young infants digest starch less completely than older babies, though the ability varies a lot between individual babies.
An enzyme called maltase-glucoamylase plays an important role in helping them break starch down.
What they found
Studies in people
Age and starch digestion
Young infants do not break down starch as well as older infants and toddlers. However, there is wide variation among individual babies in how much starch they can handle.
Key enzyme for babies
Evidence points to an enzyme called maltase-glucoamylase as being especially important for starch digestion in young infants.
What the authors conclude
- They say these findings are very important for guiding advice on feeding starch-containing foods to young infants.
How it was done
Scientists expected young infants to struggle with starch because their bodies make less of a key digestive enzyme early in life. They wanted to check whether that expectation matched what actually happens when babies eat starch.
The authors looked at existing research on how babies and toddlers develop the enzymes needed to digest starch. The abstract does not say how many studies or infants were included.
What it can’t tell you
- We summarised it from the abstract only.
- This work summarises other research rather than running a new trial, so it cannot prove cause and effect on its own.
Who paid
- Authors work at
- Texas Children's Hospital, TX
The paper
- Title
- Starch Malabsorption in Infants
- Type
- ReviewThe authors read earlier studies and describe what they found. It isn’t a new study.
- Evidence
- Studies in people
- Summarised from
- Abstract only
- Cite
- Shulman RJ (2018). Starch Malabsorption in Infants. Journal of pediatric gastroenterology and nutrition. doi:10.1097/MPG.0000000000001856PubMed 29762382DOI
Summary written 30 Sep 2026. Check it against the paper before it changes what you eat. How we summarise papers · Report an error