Your Microbiome and You
If you have turned on the TV lately, you have seen a commercial for yogurt featuring live bacteria. Yet, to many this seems entirely counter intuitive. Anyone who has lived through a E.coli outbreak (such as the Chipotle epidemic, most recently) knows how bacteria on or in our food is usually the last thing we want. It is why your eccentric aunt insists on her savory steak being charred to a crisp before she'll eat it.
And still, there are ever more products and commercials boasting the presence of live bacteria, even pills containing just that. Probiotics have become a popular commodity among every day people and not just the medical community or uber-green, health gurus. So why should we spend money on extra bacteria when it seems everything in cooking and medicine is done to prevent bacteria in our foods?
The answer: the 3 pounds of bacteria in your gut that comprise your microbiome. Within your digestive tract or colloquially, your gut, contains 100 trillion microbial cells. Your body is only made up of 10 trillion cells. Your body is in fact, more bacteria than it is human. And there is increasing evidence that these microbes can release hormones which influence your emotions, trigger autoimmune diseases, or protect you from exogenous bacteria which cause diseases.
Picture your body as a donut. Your digestive tract, from your mouth to your bottom, is one continuous hole in the center of the donut. Everything else, your head, your skin, your other organs is the donut itself. Your gut is continuous with the outside, like you can
stick your finger through a donut hole without disturbing the sweet pastry, bacteria can move from the outside world into your gut, and through it without hurting your body.
A brief qualifier here, there are still bacteria that if consumed can make you very sick. Make sure that you still cook and clean your food properly and drink pasteurized milk or non dairy milk options when possible.
Back to the 100 trillion microbes. These microbes, referred to by Heriber Watzke as the "gut brain", play an active role in our daily lives. They can make us hungry, make us full, help us enjoy lactose or make it a mortal enemy, even effect our affect. These discoveries are just scraping the surface. Over the next decade, research may allow us to diagnose, cure, or prevent diseases by looking just at our microbiomes. Meal plans may accompany our yearly physical, or perhaps a dietary workup will become routine to ensure our gut bacteria is optimizing our health. We have sequenced the human genome many times over, now will be the time to sequence the other 300 trillion parts of us, our gut.
So what can we do now to keep our guts healthy? Advocates of maintaining a healthy gut, recommend probiotics. Whether in pill form, live cultures in yogurt, or my favorite option, a good slaw. A farm in my hometown mixes and ferments their own cabbage slaw (which tastes surprisingly great) that is packed with live bacteria. The fermenting process allows bacteria to cultivate the slaw, and provides a natural and delicious way to feed your gut.
As this field continues to develop, do not fear the bacteria. Care for your microbiome, because it literally cares for you!
If you would like to learn more about our microbiomes, these Ted Talks give some great insight into our microbiomes!
https://www.ted.com/talks/heribert_watzke_the_brain_in_your_gut?language=en#t-890106