Breakthrough - Microbes and our health

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panacea
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Breakthrough - Microbes and our health

Post by panacea »

http://www.ted.com/talks/rob_knight_how ... who_we_are

Another breakthrough discovery, similar to Buteyko, Wai, Protospace, Grounding, Giordano Memorization System, Aquatic Ape Theory, Clicker Training, Forward posture chair, etc.
Golden nuggets like this are really hard to come by!

Just when you think you can't be blindsided...
The summary:
Around 3 lbs of microbes live within us, and their cell count outnumbers ours 10 to 1. Their gene count outnumbers us by even more.
By isolating mice in germ-free bubble environments, researchers have found that specific microbe colonies can not only shape reactionary characteristics such as ability to digest foods better, but also shape behavior such as eating more or less when you have food abundance.

They proved this by taking microbe colonies from healthy mice, and giving it to obese mice, and the obese mice returned to healthy weight even when given unlimited food access.
They took this a step further - they gave healthy mice microbe colonies from obese humans, and the mice became obese. They then reversed this with healthy human microbe colonies and the mice became normal weight. It's clear that the microbes, even across species, has some major influence on our body functionality. They also tested this human-to-human, by giving people who have a rare digestive condition which causes them to have daily diarrhea multiple times a day, and gave them healthy microbe samples from healthy humans, and their condition was fixed rapidly (I believe within 3 days) and stayed that way without further treatment. This rare condition was previously untreatable.

My practical and useful interest in this is the question: Can you take microbe colonies from a healthy specimen (such as a wild animal) and subject them to a human, particularly a less healthy one, and reap the benefits of the healthy microbes - decrease hunger pangs for unhealthy foods, strengthen bacterial resilience (raw food eating, infections, etc), strengthen skin microbes, get more energy from less food, maybe even combat viruses better.

Nowadays, there are not many "prime ultra healthy humans" living the ultimate health experience, but there are such samples from wild animals such as wild chimpanzees, or maybe even dolphins. Since we are semiaquatic, perhaps it would be best to take microbe colonies from an intermediate of both sea and terrestrial such as the hippo. Practically though, we may only be able to rely on domestic healthy animals such as our pets. This might actually be a way to finally solve the problem of self control over diet and behavior. You can easily force a pet dog for example to eat only the best high quality food, no junk, get them plenty of exercise, and become a truly healthy animal - then take some of their microbes for your own benefit. I know it sounds crazy, but watch the video, and you'll see where I'm coming from.

edit:
LIGHT BULB
perhaps we are already inoculated when we eat raw fish/eggs, with their microbes, and this could explain why eating the absolutely most healthy source you can find is beneficial, and you can actually inoculate yourself with unhealthy sources as well. I'm assuming you can get them from digestion and the stomach acid won't destroy everything. The video implies that people who live together tend to slowly synchronize microbe colonies over time, so there must be some channel for doing this without syringes. I haven't read much more on this yet though.
panacea
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Re: Breakthrough - Microbes and our health

Post by panacea »

Fiber actually important:

"Since roughly 9 out of 10 cells in the human body are not even human - they're microbial - and >99% of the genes in our body are held by the microbes, we at Human Food Bar think its important we start thinking about feeding the entire human (us and them). Human Food is simply food that feeds not only us, but provides nutrition for the trillions of tiny microbes deep in our gut. By consuming more dietary fiber (the greater the diversity the better), you guarantee that your colonic environment will become more acidic as well, as the microbes breakdown the fiber. This is an important consideration."

So yes, our human cells may not need fiber, but the microbes just might!
Who knew that the fiber in fruits wasn't just there for no reason after all.
panacea
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Re: Breakthrough - Microbes and our health

Post by panacea »

"In one final experiment, they put mice inoculated with the full microbiota from a lean or obese human twin and stuck them in the same cage – same as before. However, this time they changed the diet to high saturated fat, low fruit and vegetable – that is, low fiber. Like the previous experiment, the mice consumed one another’s poo but this time around, bacteria from the lean mice didn’t successfully invade the gut of the obese mice. This suggest the underlying mechanism for protection from obesity in this particular experiment is more complex, possibly involving a great many more community members then just a handful of species and diet dependent."
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RRM
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Re: Breakthrough - Microbes and our health

Post by RRM »

panacea wrote:So yes, our human cells may not need fiber, but the microbes just might!
Who knew that the fiber in fruits wasn't just there for no reason after all.
Of course the fiber is there for a reason:
Without fiber, you have no fruit.
Fibers have structural properties.
And humans have adapted to consuming fruits.

But that does not mean more (fiber) is better. At all.
Of course, nobody suggests to go totally fibreless by consuming water, sugar, oil and supplements only.
Drinking pressed or slow-juiced and subsequently sieved juices, you will still ingest lots of micro-fibers.
These fibers result in poop.
Without fiber, there is nothing to deport as poop.
Even consuming only sieved juices, there is still plenty to deport; un-used (also by microbes), undigested fiber.
Still an abundance of fiber, apparently.

It does not even mean that a greater variety of fibers is better, as in fibers from grains, legumes, veggies etc.
These fibers may be important for (the microbes in) cows, birds etc. though.
In humans, the perfect balance of microbes may feed on some microfibers from (sieved) fruit juices only.

Moreover, microbes can feed on much more than just fiber...
panacea
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Re: Breakthrough - Microbes and our health

Post by panacea »

I agree with you that sieved OJ for example has plenty of fiber, an that an excess is not needed.

What is novel about this relatively new look at the microbes in our body is how cravings are formed, which is my primary area of interest right now

"The Role Of Gut Microbiota In Food Cravings

There is growing evidence to support the role of gut microbiota in influencing why we crave certain foods.

We know that mice that are bred in germ-free environments prefer more sweets and have greater number of sweet taste receptors in their gut compared to normal mice. Research has also found that persons who are “chocolate desiring” have microbial breakdown products in their urine that are different from those of “chocolate indifferent individuals” despite eating identical diets.

Many gut bacteria can manufacture special proteins (called peptides) that are very similar to hormones such as peptide YY and ghrelin that regulate hunger. Humans and other animals have produced antibodies against these peptides. This raises the distinct possibility that microbes might be able to directly influence human eating behaviour through their peptides that mimic hunger-regulating hormones or indirectly through antibodies that can interfere with appetite regulation."

http://www.iflscience.com/health-and-me ... vings-food
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RRM
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Re: Breakthrough - Microbes and our health

Post by RRM »

Yes, that is very interesting.
Production of peptide YY also depends on other (some related) factors, such as macro-nutrient ratios; Fat and protein increase PYY more than maltodextrin (absorbed as glucose) / high carbohydrate diets. And meat stimulates PYY more so than a vegan meal does. Endurance exercise increases PYY more, and eventual relative energy intake was lower in comparison with interval exercise.
Ghrelin increases with fasting and energy restriction, and is suppressed by lipid and protein. Meat suppresses ghrelin more so than a vegan meal does.
Kasper
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Re: Breakthrough - Microbes and our health

Post by Kasper »

As it comes to fiber, only fermentable fiber is interesting, like pectin, inulin, and resistant starch. Unfermentable fiber like cellulose, won't do anything for you microbe. The pulp of orange juice is mostly cellulose if I recall correctly.

I think this explains maybe why the hazdas included baobab fruit in their diet. They basicly eat honey, meat, baobab, berries and tubers. They spit out the unfermentable fibers from the tubers. These fibers are insoluble, and they only will irritate your gut, they won't feed your bacteria.

Baobab is almost 50% soluble fiber (mostly pectin) IIRC. They won't spit out the fiber from this fruit. And eat quite a lot of this fruit actually. I think this interesting, as honey and berries contain more calories. I think they have some intuitive craving for fermentable fiber.
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summerdays
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Re: Breakthrough - Microbes and our health

Post by summerdays »

You maybe right Kasper, interesting thoughts. What does that mean for our orange juice intake though?
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RRM
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Re: Breakthrough - Microbes and our health

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Kasper wrote:The pulp of orange juice is mostly cellulose if I recall correctly.
According to Wikipedia, "pectin (various pectic polysaccharides) is produced commercially, mainly extracted from citrus fruits...
Oranges typically contain 0.5–3.5% pectin (fresh weight)"

According to the USDA,
raw orange juice contains 0.2% of fiber. (200 mg / 100 grams of OJ)

According to Souci et al,
fresh orange juice contains 86 mg pectin (variation: 57 to 120 mg) and 190 mg inositol per 100 ml of juice (cellulose is not listed).
Drinking about 4.5L per day, that is about 3.9 grams of just pectin (or x-fold more).

Sieving OJ may eliminate cellulose (not water soluble) more so than pectin (water soluble), as cellulose has typical chain lengths of hundreds (or thousands) of units. Cellulose molecules strongly bind to each other, compared to other polysaccharides.
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RRM
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Re: Breakthrough - Microbes and our health

Post by RRM »

Kasper wrote:The pulp of orange juice is mostly cellulose if I recall correctly.
You probably mean the pulp that is left in the juicer when makeing OJ.
Because that pulp is mostly the remainders of the cells (cellulose) that hold the juice; not the polysaccharides dissolved in the juice.
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