Probiotics

The Importance of Probiotics

I'll be honest, I did not know what the heck probiotics were before I started school.  Now I find them to be one of the most fascinating topics.  Most people understand the concept of "good bacteria" and "bad bacteria".  Well probiotics, are the "good guys".  I say "guys" on purpose because you must think of them as living beings.  Much of our digestive issues are caused by too many of the bad guys taking over our digestive tract.  Antibiotics are used to help fight illnesses caused by these bad guys but the problem is that it also kills the good guys.  Taking probiotics regularly and even more importantly, after the use of antibitotics, helps to replenish the good bacterial growth.

Probiotics have many roles in our body.  They offer vital help with physiological processes from digestion to growth to self-defense.  There has been a rise of modern diseases such as obesity and autoimmune disorders which can very well be linked to not having enough of the good guys inside of us.  Specifically, 2 species play a very large role in our digestion and regulation of appetite.  Bacterial cultures living in our GI tract help to break down complex cards and absorb nutrients.

We all have an individual and unique "microbiome" which is a community of microbial cells and the genes they contain.  In other words, inside of us lives a colony of living organisms.  In a European study it was founded that there are 3.3 million microbial genes found in the gut from more than 1000 species.  That is 150 times the 20,000-2500 genes in the human genome.  Our individual fates, health and even actions may have more to do with the genes found in the microbiome than what is in our own DNA.

When I imagine this microbiome I think of a specific Simpsons episode: Treehouse of Horror VII "The Genesis Tub".  Lisa has a tooth that she puts into a petri dish and in time a whole community grows out of it and becomes a very complex world.  Bart comes in and makes the environment hostile and thus wreaks havoc on the little people.  I relate this to the environment inside all of us.  We must create a positive environment so that we don't make the good guys angry and help the bad guys to multiply.  It is like we are the Earth and the bacteria are the humans.  They can kill us by adding to the demise of our over all health or help us to thrive by teaming up with our immune system and our digestive tract for optimal health.

Fermenting foods is a great way to get additional probiotics inside us.  Something that used to be so common and was a way for our ancestors to make foods last longer.  I made my very first batch of sourkrout the other week and I do believe my Baba would be very proud!

Reference:
http://faculty.rcc.edu/herrick/Biology%2011/Misc/InnerEcosystem.pdf

Interesting Reads:
http://www.collective-evolution.com/2013/10/23/genetically-modifying-humans-via-antibiotics-something-you-need-to-know/

http://www.theallergymenu.com/blog/proof-probiotics-affect-brain-function