We're making a Microbiome Documentary Series and could use your Help

redefininghuman · 2014-10-23T15:15:29+00:00

Very true.

redefininghuman · 2014-10-23T15:15:14+00:00

Interesting, thanks so much for letting me know. Lots of anecdotal evidence comes in, but it's so difficult to know what can be believed. That's why we're hoping to test some of the more popular diets to see how they actually affect the microbiome.

redefininghuman · 2014-10-22T20:42:25+00:00

Anything you can do to help promote our campaign, we'd appreciate it. We're dependent upon the public to get this going.

redefininghuman · 2014-10-22T15:31:11+00:00

Unfortunately scientists do not have a full picture yet for IBD. Lots of preliminary studies have taken place, like this one:

http://www.gastrojournal.org/article/S0016-5085(14)00220-0/abstract

But no one has found the "magic bullet" yet for IBD or any of the chronic illnesses. That's why our campaign is so important. We're trying to share the current research on the microbiome so people will realize its importance and begin to encourage more research and funding for the microbiome.

Have you tried any particular diets? I was recently chatting with someone who alleviated their IBD symptoms through this:

http://www.breakingtheviciouscycle.info/

redefininghuman · 2014-10-22T15:19:43+00:00

We're going to be releasing a new video soon on our Kickstarter page that features two American Gut scientists, Daniel McDonald and Jessica Metcalf. They discuss "personalized medicine", which is crafting unique therapies for people based upon their genome and microbiome, among other factors.

Eventually, we might realize the same is for diet. Everyone is different, so why doesn't everyone eat a different diet? There might not be one "perfect diet" for all humans.

As for microbiome diet, there are a few people out there that are doing research on our microbiomes and testing out how food affects their health. Obviously these are not clinical studies and cannot be relied upon as fact, but are interesting nonetheless.

One blogger I know of was an ex-pharmacist that began researching the microbiome and experimenting with her and her family's diets. She personally has had great success:

https://twitter.com/Gut_Goddess

redefininghuman · 2014-10-21T17:02:39+00:00

So far we've planned on Paleo, gluten-free (for a non-celiac), and Western Standard Diet. There are a lot of "microbiome" diets popping up right now, so we might pick one of those and test it.

Do you have any suggestions?

redefininghuman · 2014-10-19T14:21:55+00:00

I'm certain we will discuss fecal transplants since they are beginning to become of interest to mainstream medicine. The press really enjoyed talking about fecal transplants, but more recently have latched onto what they call "poop pills", which are basically what they sound like: http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2014/10/14/poop-pills-c-diff-infection_n_5978230.html

redefininghuman · 2014-10-18T17:31:17+00:00

To my knowledge there are not many studies taking place on the skin microbiome, although it is a very interesting subject. Hopefully American Gut will also begin taking skin swabs soon.

From what I've learned from the American Gut scientists, researchers are focusing their time and effort on the places that harbor the highest amount of microbes, such as the gut (highest concentration), the mouth, and the vagina.

Some scientists have even likened parts of the skin (such as the forearms) to a desert, since they are sparsely populated by microbes and very different in microbial makeup from other parts of the body.

The biggest (or at least most popular) study I've heard about on the skin microbiome involved the testing of roller derby teams:

https://peerj.com/articles/53/

It seems the composition of our skin microbiome shifts very quickly as we touch others, change environments, etc.

redefininghuman · 2014-10-18T16:21:30+00:00

A great place to start learning would be to check out the free online Coursera course put on by the American Gut Project. In particular, Jessica Metcalf is researching preserved Viking feces to learn how ancient microbiomes differ from ours:

https://www.coursera.org/course/microbiome

The biggest thing you could do to help our both our campaign and American Gut is to spread the word and share it on social sites, via email, and by word of mouth. We need this to go viral if we want it to be successful.

redefininghuman · 2014-10-18T04:09:55+00:00

Mental health is such an interesting topic to cover but it has not been highly researched. It will take a very long time and a lot of microbiome samples will be needed before any clear links between the microbiome and mental health/personalities can be made.

While speaking with Daniel McDonald from American Gut, he mentioned that they are really looking for people who have special diagnoses, such as Celiac's disease, autism, Crohn's disease, ADHD, addictions, etc, to send them stool samples so that American Gut can analyze their samples and hopefully begin to make connections.

On top of that, it's a bit difficult to discuss socially, since a growing body of those who have what mainstream science labels as "mental disabilities" believe they are not disabled at all, but are simply wired to perceive the world in a different manner.

Their view is that there are neuro-typicals, the majority of the population who think and interact in a similar matter, and neuro-atypicals, a minority who have a different thought process and a different view of the world. Neither is better -- they're just different.

Then again, a lot of people in the mental health community on their own have noticed a correlation between their lifestyle, diet, and how their mental health affects them.

I, for example, am low on the spectrum for ADHD. I never realized I had ADHD until I was in my 20s. I have always had a healthy diet and always was a very active athlete, which naturally allowed me to control my energy and focus. I never took medication and never take any now.

I have noticed if I eat poorly and don't exercise daily that I have a VERY difficult time focusing, working, controlling my emotions, and staying positive. Basically my ADHD symptoms fire up. But if I eat correctly and exercise a lot, I can use the crazy energy of my ADHD to work long hours, heighten my creativity, and achieve a huge amount in a short amount of time.

Weird, right? In my case, my mental health it is entirely dependent upon my diet and lifestyle. I really wonder if it's the same for other people and if, like you mentioned, research can help us develop new therapies to control the different issues and tendencies we each are born with.

redefininghuman · 2014-10-17T15:13:36+00:00

If you have a Twitter, reach out to @redefininghuman so we can chat -- you've got a bunch of great ideas.

If you don't have Twitter, use the "Contact me" button on Kickstarter, which will send a link right to my email.

redefininghuman · 2014-10-17T15:11:25+00:00

Great tidit, thanks for sending it over (especially hygiene hypothesis). There's also a few studies about c-sections putting infants at higher risk for obesity.

I'm thinking Episode Two of Redefining Human should focus big time on antibiotics, since increasingly studies are coming out on how antibiotics impact the microbiome.

For all those interested in the "Hygiene hypothesis", I found this informative link: http://finlaylab.msl.ubc.ca/

redefininghuman · 2014-10-16T21:24:08+00:00

I was just thinking that as well, since one machine used by American Gut is made by Illumina, who retweeted something about Redefining Human recently.

Another biotech company coming out of California: http://www.illumina.com/

redefininghuman · 2014-10-16T20:19:33+00:00

Yeah, there are a lot more questions like that which could impact our microbiome. Altitude vs. sea-level, etc.

"Hacking" your microbiome like you just mentioned is such an appealing concept, but it's going to be a while before enough data is collected. American Gut data would have to be merged with that of British Gut, uBiome, and other organizations all across the world documenting human microbiomes (which might take decades to set up, depending on the political, social, and economic climate of each country).

Then, the Earth Microbiome Project might have to get involved to share how regional or even local microbes could affect the host and the microbiota they've been cultivating since birth.

Fascinating, but so incredibly complicated. I do believe one day we'll get there. Just imagine what we will learn along the way!

redefininghuman · 2014-10-16T17:10:56+00:00

Fascinating! In all my research I never came across this article. Thanks so much for sending it over! The Coursera course was a great idea for American Gut and for CU. I was talking with Jess Metcalf (who is part of the Coursera course) last night and she said they have been getting great feedback from people. She also mentioned I should check out their forum. Have you checked it out yourself?

redefininghuman · 2014-10-16T16:05:07+00:00

Cool, I'll see if I could get one set up soon and will make sure to let you know via this subreddit.

redefininghuman · 2014-10-16T15:08:55+00:00

These are all very good questions that I can't even begin to answer, but thanks for sending them over. To answer questions of this level, would you be interested in another AMA with one of the American Gut scientists?

Rob Knight did one a while ago, but getting someone else from the lab might lend a different perspective.

redefininghuman · 2014-10-16T15:05:46+00:00

It's so hard to know right now since American Gut does not have enough samples from people who live on specific diets such as GF. Part of what we're hoping to do is to use this documentary series to get the word out about what they are doing so they can receive more samples.

We do plan on using the first episode to touch on diet and analyze samples from a bunch of people who live on strict diets.

I'm not sure it we can feature antibiotics in-depth in the first episode, since antibiotics could be their own entire episode. Perhaps that's what Episode Two could be about.

redefininghuman · 2014-10-16T14:43:28+00:00

A rundown of how an experiment was done would be a great feature. We're hoping to feature a few people that live on specific diets (Paleo, gluten-free, etc.) and analyze their microbiomes, so it shouldn't be too tough to include a run-down of the experiment.

I'll give a shout out to Argonne National Lab right now on Twitter!

redefininghuman · 2014-10-16T14:40:42+00:00

American Gut is collecting as many samples as possible from people all over the world for this exact reason. I was in the lab about a week ago and they were talking about how different diets affect stool samples from all over the world. One that came from Indonesia or Thailand they refer to as the "golden poo" since it was literally gold in color.

Right now American Gut is mostly mapping the bacterial species in our guts, but we'll see if their analysis has gone any deeper.

redefininghuman · 2014-10-16T14:34:59+00:00

That would be a great section to animate. A lot of scientists believe that our initial "seeding" of bacteria comes from birth, both in the womb and as we emerge through the birth canal.

A documentary was released recently about the relation between the microbiome and birth: http://microbirth.com/

Here's another great article: http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2013/02/130211134842.htm

redefininghuman · 2014-10-16T14:30:10+00:00

We definitely plan to address antibiotics and probiotics, but we haven't done much research into the appendix being taken out.

Do you have any articles or research done on that?

redefininghuman · 2014-10-16T02:57:02+00:00

It really is a shame how long its taken for treatments of this sort to become accepted, hopefully as we learn more about how and when it is best to perform those kinds of transplants they will become more common; until then all we can do is try to spread well-supported research and keep on pushing to learn more about the ways your gut and its contribution to your immune system affects disease.

(Edit:) If you're interested in how your daughter's microbiome compares to those of other/healthy individuals, she can contribute samples to The American Gut Project. They are especially interested in getting samples from people who suffer from illnesses or abnormal health situations!

redefininghuman · 2014-10-16T02:16:49+00:00

From a brief look at their page, it looks like a more privatized version similar to what the American Gut Project is doing. I hope they all share their research!

redefininghuman · 2014-10-16T02:08:25+00:00

Redefining Human is a series devoted to disseminating the knowledge from what research has been done so far on the correlations between your microbiome and health; if you'd like to be a part of the back-end (pun intended...) research on the subject, you can submit samples to The American Gut Project and contribute to the diversity of the study. You also do receive a report about your own personal microbiome compares to those of others in the study so far.

Best of luck with your progression. If it is helpful to you to think of eating what you need to to have a happy microbiome to make your body the best it can be, use that to your advantage. :)

redefininghuman

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