Speaker 1: Welcome to Stuff you Should Know, a production of I
Speaker 1: Heart Radio. Hey, and welcome to the podcast. I'm Josh
Speaker 1: Clark and there's Charles w Chuck Brian over there, and
Speaker 1: it's just the two of us who were flying solo.
Speaker 1: Um and that's okay, we're gonna do this and this
Speaker 1: is stuff you should know. Yeah, you know before we
Speaker 1: get go in. We are the worst self promoters. And
Speaker 1: we consistently forget to tell people that we have a
Speaker 1: book in a board game for sale for Christmas. That's
Speaker 1: a great, great point. And every once in a while
Speaker 1: they'll say things like, you know, if you guys want
Speaker 1: to mention this, did they say? I feel like every
Speaker 1: now and then we get emails that say, hey, did
Speaker 1: you forget that you have these things? I don't forget.
Speaker 1: I just assumed like everybody doesn't want to hear about it,
Speaker 1: you know. Oh I know. But we're just not good
Speaker 1: at this. As we stumble through at another self promotion,
Speaker 1: they have a book in the board game and they
Speaker 1: both make great Christmas gifts. Please stop, this is making
Speaker 1: me so uncomfortable. Oh, buy them, everybody. Yeah, they're actually
Speaker 1: pretty good. We're proud of both of them. I mean
Speaker 1: we like, like we wrote a book, and we also
Speaker 1: um with our good buddy knows Parker, I should say,
Speaker 1: and we also helped create a board game with our
Speaker 1: good buddies over at Trivial Pursuit. So yeah, I'm very
Speaker 1: proud of It's a it's a legacy kind of thing,
Speaker 1: you know. That's right. So we might have a couple
Speaker 1: of these reminders before Christmas because they do make great
Speaker 1: gifts for this stuff. You should know, friend in your life. Absolutely,
Speaker 1: So that was a great idea, Chuck, And it didn't
Speaker 1: feel so bad after all. That's right. And now onto
Speaker 1: our probably I think eighth episode. I think that culminates.
Speaker 1: It's culminated in this after many many episodes dealing with
Speaker 1: this stuff. Well, that's funny that you say that, because
Speaker 1: I was gonna caveat this with this this will we
Speaker 1: will surely do another episode on this down the road
Speaker 1: within the next several years, I'm sure, because you're obsessed
Speaker 1: with it. I'm obsessed with a number one. Absolutely, it's
Speaker 1: one of the most interesting things because this kind of
Speaker 1: stuff we're gonna talk about, the gut, brain, microbiome access
Speaker 1: um and it reveals, Chuck, like how little we actually
Speaker 1: know about our bodies and how they function, but it
Speaker 1: also provides these tantalizing clues about how cool the stuff
Speaker 1: we have left to understand is. You know what I mean,
Speaker 1: one day we're gonna understand exactly how our bodies function
Speaker 1: and it's going to be mind boggling. I'm just very
Speaker 1: excited about it. So yes, I'm obsessed with it. But
Speaker 1: the other reason why we'll surely do it again is
Speaker 1: because the stuff that we're going to talk about, we've
Speaker 1: got to disclaim this episode and that it's pioneering, like
Speaker 1: like cutting edge research, not bleeding edge, cutting edge research,
Speaker 1: so it's going to keep evolving. But that also means Charles,
Speaker 1: that that that you and I can just be like gee,
Speaker 1: whiz and wow at this point because this is all
Speaker 1: like just very early study kind of stuff. That's right,
Speaker 1: And if you want to really get ready for this one,
Speaker 1: you could listen to episodes on digestion, vehicle transplants, the
Speaker 1: microbio human human microbiome, project immune system, probiotics, and even
Speaker 1: our old buddy Fight or Flight. Yeah, and then just
Speaker 1: listen to the one on Pyromania for kicks. Did we
Speaker 1: do one on Pyromania? Of course, man, we did. Funny,
Speaker 1: I was looking through the list the other day for
Speaker 1: for a very special thing we have coming up that
Speaker 1: we can announce yet. It's more self promotion too, which
Speaker 1: we're very excited about. But I was looking through all
Speaker 1: of our episodes and boy, it's getting more and more around, like,
Speaker 1: huh what really? Yeah, imagine somebody trying to wade into
Speaker 1: this stuff and just encountering it now, you know. Yeah.
Speaker 1: It was at one point though, I was like, was
Speaker 1: I abducted For a few years, I don't remember a
Speaker 1: lot of these. Yeah, I have the same same thing
Speaker 1: going on. But also, Chuck, now that you mentioned the list,
Speaker 1: I want to give a huge hat tip again to
Speaker 1: our Minister of Stats, Jill Hurley just doggedly and tirelessly
Speaker 1: chronicles every single episode we've ever done. There's a Google
Speaker 1: sheet out there that's open access that has every single
Speaker 1: episode in order, including the selects or when they ran
Speaker 1: as a select. Just it's just an amazing thing that
Speaker 1: she's doing for free, for the love of it. I'm
Speaker 1: guessing she still loves it. I hope Uh, well, Hurls
Speaker 1: if nothing else is uh stubborn, she won't quit even
Speaker 1: if so, let's talk about the gut brain microbiome access chuck,
Speaker 1: because there's a couple of ways to look at it.
Speaker 1: And the first way is the way that you would
Speaker 1: expect that you do things like digest food. Um. Your
Speaker 1: gut lining is produced mu gus um. You poop things
Speaker 1: out after you eat them, you even swallow, and your
Speaker 1: brain has a lot of other stuff to do than
Speaker 1: to just micro manage that. So you have an entirely
Speaker 1: different secondary central nervous system that's dedicated exclusively to um eating,
Speaker 1: digesting and harvesting nutrients from your food. And that's called
Speaker 1: the enteric nervous system. That's right, uh, And this is
Speaker 1: definitely when we hit on in the digestion episode, but
Speaker 1: they handle it all in the enteric nervous system. The
Speaker 1: e n S is really um similar in a lot
Speaker 1: of ways to our own central nervous system, and that
Speaker 1: it's made up of uh nerves and neurons and neurotransmitters,
Speaker 1: and it kind of does its own thing for the
Speaker 1: most part as far as controlling that stuff without the
Speaker 1: central nervous system lording over it. Saying you forgot this part.
Speaker 1: You might want to move this through the intestine a
Speaker 1: little quicker it and it does its own thing. But
Speaker 1: this gut brain sort of connection that we're talking about
Speaker 1: is really a connection between the e n S and
Speaker 1: the CNS because they have figured that these two systems
Speaker 1: talked to each other, and they talked to each other
Speaker 1: from the gut to the brain, which is the really
Speaker 1: surprising part. We've kind of always known that the brain
Speaker 1: talks to the gut, but now we're learning, Hey, it
Speaker 1: looks like the gut is actually sending messages to the brain,
Speaker 1: and a lot of the stuff we thought was a
Speaker 1: certain way could be actually backwards. Like ib S. Yeah,
Speaker 1: Like we've thought for a very long time that people
Speaker 1: with IBS UM, which is basically your your lower parts
Speaker 1: aren't working at full um, full steam. Either you're pooping
Speaker 1: too much and you've got really thin, watery poops, or
Speaker 1: you're pooping too little you're constipated. Either way, you have
Speaker 1: irritable bow. It's one of the most appropriately named syndromes
Speaker 1: there is, right, And of course everybody's walking around knowing
Speaker 1: that anybody who has ib s is UM suffering from
Speaker 1: like stress or anxiety, and so it's bringing on like
Speaker 1: digestive issues. Well, this is what this this is why
Speaker 1: this stuff is so mind blowing? Is this the field
Speaker 1: of research that investigates the gut brain microbiome access is saying, Actually,
Speaker 1: it's like Chuck just said, it might go both ways.
Speaker 1: You might have stress and anxiety not because of your
Speaker 1: your job or you know, like you're there's some something
Speaker 1: stressing you out. The guy down the block keeps looking
Speaker 1: at you, weird, That's not why you're stressed out or anxious.
Speaker 1: It's because you have IBS. That's causing your your stress
Speaker 1: and anxiety. We may have have had it backwards all
Speaker 1: this time. Yeah, And to be specific, like you can
Speaker 1: get anxiety obviously because you have IBS. But what they're
Speaker 1: saying is is that it's a chicken in the egg thing.
Speaker 1: Is the origin of this is actually in the gut
Speaker 1: and not like, oh, I have ib S because I'm anxious, right,
Speaker 1: And the reason why they're saying that this is even
Speaker 1: possible is because is that cross talk goes both ways,
Speaker 1: Like there's a We're starting to find more and more
Speaker 1: evidence of just how the gut could possibly speak to
Speaker 1: the brain and send its own signals, and one of
Speaker 1: the main ones is the vegas nerve, which made a
Speaker 1: starring appearance in our episode on what happens in the
Speaker 1: brain during an orgasm. The vegas nerve is all about that,
Speaker 1: but the vegas nerve also has a lot to do
Speaker 1: with connecting the enteric nervous system with the central nervous
Speaker 1: system as well. Yeah, I mean we've known for a
Speaker 1: long time. Uh, And we talked about this sum in
Speaker 1: our Fight or Flight episode that you know, Let's say
Speaker 1: you're out in the woods and you're camping and you
Speaker 1: have to go to the potty, and you go and
Speaker 1: you you squat down in the middle of nowhere. You're
Speaker 1: enjoying your time, you're about to do your business, and
Speaker 1: a bear pops his head up your your body. Well,
Speaker 1: the bear is like, I know what that means, but
Speaker 1: I'm here to interrupt that. The bears and I poop
Speaker 1: in the woods too, that's right. Uh, that bear like
Speaker 1: you will go on an immediate sphincter lock. And it's
Speaker 1: not just because um, it's not just a physical reaction
Speaker 1: you and you have like you choose to do like, oh,
Speaker 1: I better stop what I'm doing because there's a bear.
Speaker 1: Like your body goes into fight or flight and it
Speaker 1: sends your brain sends a signal to your body saying,
Speaker 1: whatever else you're doing, shut it down now, because the
Speaker 1: most important thing going on right now is this barre
Speaker 1: in front of you. Yeah, like the FBI guy and
Speaker 1: die Hard, shut it down now. But that's what man,
Speaker 1: because the brain is saying, we've got, um, we've got
Speaker 1: much better things to do with the energy that you're
Speaker 1: using to digest that food right now. So of course
Speaker 1: the brain can talk to the to the enteric nervous
Speaker 1: system when it's fight or flight time. And at this point, Chuck,
Speaker 1: I want to give another huge hat tip to our
Speaker 1: own Dave Rouse, who helped us with this one bang
Speaker 1: up job. He came up with an entirely new phrase
Speaker 1: for fight or flight battle or skitaddle. It's so good
Speaker 1: that I wrote an email just calling that one out
Speaker 1: to him, saying like this was a priceless term. He said,
Speaker 1: that was all mine, so hopefully figure out a way
Speaker 1: to copyright that one he made up for Bruce Springstein,
Speaker 1: that's right. So um, so, yes, we know that the
Speaker 1: brain can talk to the e N S, but the
Speaker 1: e N S can talk to the brain via the
Speaker 1: vegas nerve as well. And what they're figuring out is
Speaker 1: that it communicates in a number of different ways with
Speaker 1: the vegas nerve um specifically, uh those the and this
Speaker 1: is why they call it the um gut brain microbiota
Speaker 1: or microbiome access because what we're figuring out is, yes,
Speaker 1: you have cells that lying your your intestines, your guts
Speaker 1: that are neurons, You have neural cells, you have sensory cells,
Speaker 1: you have a lot of the same cells that um
Speaker 1: your brain uses to make sense of the world. Where
Speaker 1: your gut has those same cells too. But we're figuring
Speaker 1: out that the bacteria that lives in your gut is
Speaker 1: actually communicating to your brain and saying, hey, change this behavior,
Speaker 1: Hey try this instead. Hey have you considered a red sweater?
Speaker 1: Greens just not your color, Like, the bacteria that live
Speaker 1: in our gut are telling our brains what to do.
Speaker 1: In some ways, it's pretty remarkable. This is why we
Speaker 1: keep talking about this chuck. The bacteria. In addition to
Speaker 1: doing all the other great things they do, they produce metabolites,
Speaker 1: and these metabolites actually do function as neurotransmitters. And one
Speaker 1: of the big examples that Dave dug up and this
Speaker 1: is it's a big part of kind of one of
Speaker 1: the cruxes of this communication with the gut in the
Speaker 1: brain or these short chain fatty acids s f c
Speaker 1: A s. They are byproducts, are natural byproducts of fermentation
Speaker 1: when you're digesting this dietary fiber, if you're hopefully eating
Speaker 1: enough dietary fiber, something I've had to do a lot
Speaker 1: more lately. It's so good for you, it's crazy. It
Speaker 1: seems like the key to health. It is. And I
Speaker 1: don't want to get to uh gross here, but I've
Speaker 1: been on a lot of high fiber and I have
Speaker 1: been more gassy than I've ever been in my life.
Speaker 1: And it's not even stinky gassy. It's just it's almost
Speaker 1: just like air. Very lucky. Yeah, because those are saying my, my,
Speaker 1: my toots don't stink anymore at all ever, But these
Speaker 1: like fiber toots don't really stink. That is really bizarre,
Speaker 1: because cruciferous vegetable toots can really clear room. I guess
Speaker 1: there is a way to put it. That's your blessed, chuck,
Speaker 1: your hashtag blessed. Oh well, my family's blessed, I guess.
Speaker 1: But because I don't really care, but you're like, I
Speaker 1: kind of miss it. But where were we short chain
Speaker 1: fatty acids. Um, they are, like I said, natural byproducts,
Speaker 1: and they play a really big role in the digestive track.
Speaker 1: And they're sending there one of the things sending these
Speaker 1: signals to your e n s and they're saying, hey,
Speaker 1: maybe you should make more mucus. Maybe I can get
Speaker 1: the gut a little less inflamed um, maybe I can
Speaker 1: stop a little leakage from happening. And so so the
Speaker 1: short chain fatty acids themselves, they're they're they're involved in neurotransmitters,
Speaker 1: but apparently they can talk to the brain themselves to right,
Speaker 1: like they don't have to convert into anything else, I think,
Speaker 1: so like just through through the vegas nerve. Right, yes,
Speaker 1: and so so here's where we're at. Yes, they go
Speaker 1: through the vegas nerve. That's the key here, um. And
Speaker 1: we've recently found a new kind of cell that line
Speaker 1: the the gut that are actually connected. They connect the
Speaker 1: gut to the vegas nerve. They're called neuropods cells. And
Speaker 1: that's how they think that the gut is actually communicating
Speaker 1: with the brain through the vegas nerve. They think they
Speaker 1: found kind of like the smoking gun to the missing
Speaker 1: link or whatever. But um, that's how these short chain
Speaker 1: fatty acids would travel up the nerve, they would send
Speaker 1: their signal up the nerve, or they would travel through
Speaker 1: the circulatory system, which is another way that they figured
Speaker 1: out the gut can actually impact the brain. Is so
Speaker 1: you get the vagus, nerve um, and then you have
Speaker 1: the circulatory system. And if all of those metabolites that
Speaker 1: are being produced by your bacteria, they're fermenting in different
Speaker 1: bacteria ferment create different metabolites as they ferment your food
Speaker 1: and your dietary fiber, and those metabolites, like you said,
Speaker 1: sometimes they're short chain fatty acids sometimes which can be
Speaker 1: like a precursor to neurotransmitters or possibly a neuro transmitter itself.
Speaker 1: They actually build actual neurotransmitters to like seratonin, UM, dopamine, GABBA,
Speaker 1: nor adrenaline. All these things are actually constructed by the
Speaker 1: bacteria in your gut as well. And we know for
Speaker 1: a fact that those things can make it through the
Speaker 1: circulatory system to the brain and they definitely have an
Speaker 1: impact on the brain and what the brain does. All right,
Speaker 1: maybe we should take a break, all right, take a
Speaker 1: pause for the cause I'm just gonna keep talking through
Speaker 1: the ad break. I'm too excited, all right, We'll be
Speaker 1: back right after this. I skate, all right. So when
Speaker 1: we left, we were talking about a lot of stuff
Speaker 1: that sounds pretty amazing and that we're just figuring out,
Speaker 1: one of which is that, uh, the short chain fatty
Speaker 1: acids are actually able to stimulate that vegas nerve that
Speaker 1: we were talking about that stimulates nerrow the production of neurotransmitters.
Speaker 1: But here's sort of the the headline is some of
Speaker 1: these neurotransmitters can actually play a role in mood disorders.
Speaker 1: So we're not just talking about um a two way
Speaker 1: street with things like fight or flight. We're talking about
Speaker 1: potentially autism, Parkinson's depression, anxiety like we were talking about
Speaker 1: with IBS. And they know this because they took in
Speaker 1: these poor little mice that they're always, you know, doing
Speaker 1: the hard work on mice, but they've taken mice. They've
Speaker 1: severed the vegas nerve in mice to see what happened.
Speaker 1: And what they observed was that this gut bacteria had
Speaker 1: a real effect on brain chemistry because when they shut
Speaker 1: it down, they found big time reduction in stress hormone levels.
Speaker 1: Like they completely went away in these mice, right would
Speaker 1: you would think they're stress hormones would go up having
Speaker 1: their vegus nerves ever, that would be a really stressful thing.
Speaker 1: But now, um so that but that that's really like
Speaker 1: a good illustration of the point that we're at in research.
Speaker 1: We there's there's not been a thing where it's like, oh,
Speaker 1: this is exactly how this happens. This is how your
Speaker 1: gut microbiota affects you know, your your your brain and
Speaker 1: your brain chemistry. We're not there yet. We just know
Speaker 1: that there is a definite correlation, not just in my studies, Chuck,
Speaker 1: but also in um human studies, which we'll talk about later.
Speaker 1: Like there's plenty of human diseases that we've long known
Speaker 1: if you have this disease, you also have like irritable
Speaker 1: but irritable bowel syndrome or constipation is a hallmark of
Speaker 1: this neurological disorder that um that you wouldn't expect. We've
Speaker 1: known that they're connected, and that's it's all kind of correlative.
Speaker 1: Now we're trying to figure out the causes of it.
Speaker 1: That's right, and it's not just like this communication isn't
Speaker 1: only happening through the vegus nerve. Uh. You kind of
Speaker 1: briefly mentioned before the break. But there are all kinds
Speaker 1: of ways that they're communicating that we're founding out. One
Speaker 1: of them is through the circulatory system. We used to
Speaker 1: think that the brain was just sort of shut down
Speaker 1: from behind the blood brain barrier. But now they're they're
Speaker 1: showing that, like hormones are getting through there, other things
Speaker 1: are passing through. We've known about grellin. We've talked about
Speaker 1: grellin for a while, the hunger hormone that basically the
Speaker 1: stomach produces. It sends a message to the brain that
Speaker 1: says I'm hungry. So we've known that can pass through.
Speaker 1: But now they're learning things Like you mentioned serotonin to me.
Speaker 1: This is one of the facts of the show of
Speaker 1: our Serantonin is actually produced by gut bacteria. Yeah, and um,
Speaker 1: I mean the brain also can produce serotonin, It can
Speaker 1: produce its own, But it appears that right that the serotonin,
Speaker 1: a lot of the serotonin that the brain uses comes
Speaker 1: from the gut, comes from bacteria fermenting food and producing
Speaker 1: as a biproduct of metabolism. It just so happens to
Speaker 1: produce this neurotransmitter. And I don't think I don't think
Speaker 1: anybody who's looking into this is saying it just so happens,
Speaker 1: like we appear to have co evolved to take advantage
Speaker 1: of this, Like these bacteria started colonizing our guts producing
Speaker 1: serotonin so much that our bodies found a way to
Speaker 1: really use serotonin in all sorts of different ways, including
Speaker 1: our brain to regulate mood and stuff like that. And
Speaker 1: that's like one of the one of the huge underlying
Speaker 1: messages of this is that our microbiome, the bacteria that
Speaker 1: live inside of us, they have way more genes than
Speaker 1: we have. We have something like to genes in the
Speaker 1: human genome, but our microbiome typically has something like two
Speaker 1: million combined genes. And with those genes, with all those
Speaker 1: extra genes that we don't have, all that bacteria can
Speaker 1: produce stuff that we can't even produce, like vitamins and
Speaker 1: neurotransmitters that we wouldn't necessarily be able to produce on
Speaker 1: our own, and yet we rely on to function correctly.
Speaker 1: That's that's like, that's the most amazing example of symbiosis
Speaker 1: I've ever heard in my life. But the idea that
Speaker 1: bacteria fermenting food in your gut chuck affects your mood
Speaker 1: or your outlook or whether you have a um a
Speaker 1: cognitive disorder. Like that's really substantial. It's super it's super substantial.
Speaker 1: I know, I feel like I could have come up
Speaker 1: with a better descriptor than really substantial, But I'm just
Speaker 1: to agog. Should we talk about the study of college students? Yea,
Speaker 1: as far as you know, trying to provide a link
Speaker 1: between stretch, like a two way street between stress and
Speaker 1: our gut. Uh. They said, well, there's no better place
Speaker 1: to go than to college students who are prepping for exams.
Speaker 1: And they said, if we're going to find out what's
Speaker 1: going on down there, we need to look at their stools.
Speaker 1: And they tested the stools during exam week and found
Speaker 1: that their feces had a lot less lactobacilly, which is
Speaker 1: one of the good back tier. Is then during the
Speaker 1: first week week of class when they're just getting to
Speaker 1: know each other and partying and stuff like that. The
Speaker 1: same when they studied monkeys, little infant monkeys, And it's
Speaker 1: one of those tests that's a little bit sad. No
Speaker 1: one's dying here, but they're stressing out mama monkeys on purpose.
Speaker 1: So they've got these mama monkeys and they'll play these
Speaker 1: loud noises while they're pregnant to kind of like shock them.
Speaker 1: And with the mothers who had to say, what, I
Speaker 1: gotta stop you. I'm sorry, you just made a shock
Speaker 1: the Monkey joke without even intending. Yes, I could not
Speaker 1: let that walk by. Congratulations on the monkey Monkey great song.
Speaker 1: Did you know I gotta shut the monkey? Do? Dude?
Speaker 1: Do dude? Um? I wonder if they just walk around
Speaker 1: singing that constantly? He was. Probably there's no way they don't.
Speaker 1: And then they get home at night and they're like, oh,
Speaker 1: and they feel a little get about it because they
Speaker 1: remember why they're singing shock the Monkey, because they're actually
Speaker 1: shocking monkeys for a living. Or and we mean shocking
Speaker 1: with loud noises, not shocking with electricity. Right, Well, yeah,
Speaker 1: that's what I guess. Peter Gabriel men too, But no,
Speaker 1: I think about I don't know, maybe he was talking
Speaker 1: about with electricity or I wonder if there's just one
Speaker 1: person like the person who runs the lab on their
Speaker 1: way out says, you know, because they probably do it
Speaker 1: in their sleep there so you remember you got to
Speaker 1: shock the monkey tonight, and they everyone else just rolls
Speaker 1: their eyes and they have to They have to put
Speaker 1: up with Marty where the lab yeah, and where's the
Speaker 1: piano keyboard? Tie? Every day. But they're different ones too,
Speaker 1: because some of them have red backgrounds. You can tell
Speaker 1: they're a little different alright. So, uh so they make
Speaker 1: these loud noises and then the monkey, the mama monkeys
Speaker 1: who were shocked, uh by these sounds, they had gut
Speaker 1: microbiomes with a lot lower levels of this good bacteria
Speaker 1: of lactobacilly and boy bifi doughe bacteria, bacteria that's like
Speaker 1: stuff in yogurt, I think both of those, which we'll
Speaker 1: get to all right there. But they had a despotic
Speaker 1: disbiotic microbiome. Is the upshot of it, right, You get
Speaker 1: unbalanced basically because of these stress noises that they hear, right, So,
Speaker 1: but it goes the other way too, that they're figuring
Speaker 1: out that if your gut microbiome gets out of balance,
Speaker 1: then that can make you stressed out right, that can
Speaker 1: that can actually lead to mood disorders that they're they're
Speaker 1: connecting like a really poor diet. It's very low and
Speaker 1: like dietary fiber, because again, that's what your microbiome likes
Speaker 1: to crunch on and produces really important things like serotonin
Speaker 1: and dope. I mean from that, if you don't eat
Speaker 1: very well, it's possible your mood might not be as great,
Speaker 1: or your outlook on life, or your mental health might
Speaker 1: not be as great as it could be if you
Speaker 1: actually did have a much healthier diet. That is very
Speaker 1: sub stanchel it is, and I think that kind of
Speaker 1: stuff kind of feeds on each other. It becomes this
Speaker 1: circular loop. Yeah, well that was something that was that
Speaker 1: Dave pointed out to that they're starting to realize that
Speaker 1: your CNS, your central nervous system, and your entire nervous
Speaker 1: system are probably in communication constantly. They're just sharing information
Speaker 1: back and forth because there's no it doesn't make any
Speaker 1: evolutionary sense for your bacteria to just be running the
Speaker 1: show and telling your brain what to do. That's one
Speaker 1: of the grimmest things I can possibly imagine, is that
Speaker 1: we're actually just puppets for bacteria and our guts. But
Speaker 1: at the same time, it doesn't make sense for your
Speaker 1: brain to be controlling your e n S. Your e
Speaker 1: n S is a semi autonomous nervous system, so they're
Speaker 1: not bossing each other around. They're just sharing information and
Speaker 1: then making adjustments accordingly. But they can also affect one
Speaker 1: another and impact one another negatively when things are out
Speaker 1: of whack, whether you're stressed out, it can affect your gut,
Speaker 1: or if your gut's not doing well, it can stress
Speaker 1: you out. That's what we're trying. And that is so
Speaker 1: substantial is that the second time he said that third third,
Speaker 1: I don't think you picked up the second one. That's
Speaker 1: all right, and this is like the reason this is
Speaker 1: big stuff. And if you're wondering, like, yeah, but where
Speaker 1: is this all leading, We're about to tell you because
Speaker 1: if you have uh, I mean it's not just ib S,
Speaker 1: if you have Parkinson's, or if you or a family
Speaker 1: member is on the autism spectrum disorder. They're not saying
Speaker 1: that they can cure this stuff, but they are finding
Speaker 1: out very promising tests and studies that things like Parkinson's
Speaker 1: and autism can be um can be mitigated somewhat with
Speaker 1: the use of certain probiotics and maybe in the future
Speaker 1: fecal transplants. Yeah, I don't think anybody credible is saying like, oh,
Speaker 1: we can cure autism spectrum disorder with um, you know,
Speaker 1: probiotics or something like that. But there's a lot of
Speaker 1: mounting evidence that you can alleviate a lot of the symptoms,
Speaker 1: including things like UM uh like behavior that like social
Speaker 1: avoidance UM or not being interested in social novelty, UM,
Speaker 1: A lot of the classic symptoms that as associated with
Speaker 1: autism spectrum to sword that in my studies at least,
Speaker 1: do they clear up a little bit, they adjust, They
Speaker 1: actually kind of go away in some cases when you
Speaker 1: adjust the gut microbiota of these mice who have the
Speaker 1: mice analogy of autism. Yeah, and you know g I
Speaker 1: problems are UM not always, but pretty much synonymous with
Speaker 1: autism spectrum disorder. Uh. If you have Parkinson's, you probably
Speaker 1: also have constipation. This has been true from the very
Speaker 1: first patients that were diagnosed by by Dr Parkinson himself.
Speaker 1: He realized that you also have constipation back then. This
Speaker 1: is sort of in the age where I can't remember
Speaker 1: one of the recent episodes where he used to sort
Speaker 1: of have colonics and enemas for almost everything. Well, that
Speaker 1: was probably the Kellogg's episode. Now we referenced the it
Speaker 1: was like a couple of weeks ago. Okay. I don't
Speaker 1: know why we talked about colonics and animals a lot
Speaker 1: in this show. I think it was maybe we're talking
Speaker 1: about the bleeders the barber's. Uh, yeah, that was it,
Speaker 1: because they used to give people animals for everything. But
Speaker 1: they may have been onto something a little bit. Is
Speaker 1: like kind of quacky as it sounded back in the
Speaker 1: day where if you had Parkinson's and constipation, they would
Speaker 1: give you a colonic or something or an enema and
Speaker 1: it would kind of help your Parkinson's out. And people
Speaker 1: dismiss that a long time ago, but they may have
Speaker 1: actually been onto something a little bit there. Yeah. The
Speaker 1: idea is that this is the current understanding of why
Speaker 1: Parkinson's and um and and gut issues may be related,
Speaker 1: is that they actually think it might start with gut issues.
Speaker 1: That you have a certain type of E. Coli that's
Speaker 1: producing a protein called curly su r l i, and
Speaker 1: that curly has an effect in causing other proteins to misfold,
Speaker 1: which makes it a pre on. Remember those. Yeah, So
Speaker 1: this pre on curly causes misfolding of proteins in your gut. Uh,
Speaker 1: they end up clumping, which ends up constipating you. And
Speaker 1: this process starts a good twenty years before you show
Speaker 1: the classic symptoms of Parkinson's. This is amazing, right, But
Speaker 1: the point is is that by this time, after twenty years,
Speaker 1: your curly production has gotten so good that it starts
Speaker 1: to travel up to the brain where it starts misfolding
Speaker 1: proteins up there, and then you start to have the
Speaker 1: classic symptoms of Parkinson's like tremors and shaking and eventually
Speaker 1: possibly even hallucinations and things like that. Um that that
Speaker 1: is all that, but that it all starts in your
Speaker 1: gut with these um the E coli that that is
Speaker 1: colonized your gut miss creating this curly protein pre on. Yeah,
Speaker 1: and this is one of those where like research is
Speaker 1: gonna help hopefully yield some uh if not cure some
Speaker 1: things that and help mitigate some of the effects of Parkinson's.
Speaker 1: But what it really could do is service and an
Speaker 1: early warning system. That's not to say that if you
Speaker 1: have constipation, you're gonna get Parkinson's in twenty years, but
Speaker 1: if you have chronic constipation, and it could be one
Speaker 1: of those things that they then look out and say, hey,
Speaker 1: this is something we might need to watch out for, right.
Speaker 1: And that's actually I've seen somebody proposing a paper from
Speaker 1: I think this year, UM, that you that that you
Speaker 1: use the bio markers of what's called leaky gut UM
Speaker 1: as a early diagnosis of autism, because autism is usually
Speaker 1: diagnosed after a few years of age UM I think
Speaker 1: maybe three or five or something like that, that they
Speaker 1: don't typically diagnose it before then, but that you would
Speaker 1: have leaky gut like long before this, and you could
Speaker 1: you know, find it and possibly treat it because so
Speaker 1: leaky gut is this idea where your your your gut
Speaker 1: lining is meant to be semi permeable, where only the
Speaker 1: stuff your gut wants to make it through, like nutrients
Speaker 1: and neurotransmitters and stuff like that UM, are able to
Speaker 1: pass through. Leaky gut is where you have basically holes
Speaker 1: and cracks and that that that lining and so unwanted
Speaker 1: stuff like toxins and bogs and um partially digestive food
Speaker 1: can make it through your gut and causes inflammation and
Speaker 1: then there's this whole cascading problem. And that that is
Speaker 1: why UM leaky gut is associated with things like autism
Speaker 1: and I think even rhuma, toy arthritis, and a whole
Speaker 1: host of other other diseases. So they're saying, if we
Speaker 1: look for leaky gut and we find it, there's a
Speaker 1: good chance. I think, like people on the autism spectrum
Speaker 1: have leaky gut as well, UM, that that would be
Speaker 1: a pretty good indication of autism diagnosis later in life. Yeah.
Speaker 1: I talked to uh one of my really good friends
Speaker 1: has a son with autism, and I was texting him
Speaker 1: about this, and it's like, man, there's a lot of
Speaker 1: really interesting research. And asked him about his son having
Speaker 1: g I issues and he said since day one, literally,
Speaker 1: And you know, I was like, you're gonna really dig this.
Speaker 1: He's a listener to so it's like, you're gonna really
Speaker 1: dig this episode. I said. There, they've come a long way,
Speaker 1: I said, and you know that the future looks bright
Speaker 1: for you know, helping to mitigate maybe some symptoms. Yeah,
Speaker 1: there seems to be treatable. Leaky gut seems to be
Speaker 1: a treatable thing where it's probably the result of UH
Speaker 1: dis biotic um microbiota um and that if you you know,
Speaker 1: introduce certain kinds of um of bacteria that you want
Speaker 1: that's missing. It may actually alleviate symptoms. Um. Again, I
Speaker 1: don't think anybody's saying like you can cure autism just
Speaker 1: with probiotics, but it's possible that that probiotics could really change, um,
Speaker 1: somebody with autisms life for the better in a lot
Speaker 1: of ways just from a probiotics supplement. And so there's
Speaker 1: a bunch of companies apparently, uh, they're just growing. Vential
Speaker 1: capitalists are just throwing money at any company working on
Speaker 1: this right now. They're called psychobiotics. Um. This idea that
Speaker 1: you can create like a probiotic cocktail to treat something
Speaker 1: like autism or multiple sc sclerosis or or rheumatoid arthritis,
Speaker 1: and that you don't have to use pharmaceuticals or drugs
Speaker 1: that function in ways we don't really understand that what
Speaker 1: you're doing is going to the bacteria and saying here,
Speaker 1: live here and do your natural thing and produce this
Speaker 1: stuff that this patient isn't producing on their own, won't you?
Speaker 1: And that's just the most substantial way you can think
Speaker 1: of to treat something like that. Super substantial, super substantial.
Speaker 1: All right, Well, let's take our second break and we
Speaker 1: will come back and wrap this puppy upright after this
Speaker 1: kind of huge sk So back to the autism spectrum disorder. Uh.
Speaker 1: They have found that this is about ten years ago.
Speaker 1: They found a correlation between mothers who had a high
Speaker 1: uh sort of long term, prolonged fever during pregnancy that
Speaker 1: they were seven times more likely to give birth to
Speaker 1: a baby who had symptoms of a s D. Again
Speaker 1: correlation uh. And then again the mice come into play.
Speaker 1: They got these pregnant mice, they infected them with a
Speaker 1: flu virus. Uh, it's just poor mice, and they caused
Speaker 1: a spiking fever and they gave birth to babies. And
Speaker 1: they can't test baby mice for autism, but what they
Speaker 1: can do is study their patterns and their behaviors. And
Speaker 1: they did find that they had limited social interactions, they
Speaker 1: had decreased vocalizations, they were doing repeated behaviors, they had
Speaker 1: leaky bowels, some of the things that you might experience
Speaker 1: on the autism spectrum disorder. Right, So they kind of
Speaker 1: trace that to this idea, this theory, and there's a
Speaker 1: bunch of theories about how people might develop autism, but
Speaker 1: this idea that um, when the mom has a fever UH,
Speaker 1: an immune response is activated by a gut micro a
Speaker 1: particular one called segmented filamentous bacteria, and that it gets
Speaker 1: uh T cells and cytokines active. Remember we talked about
Speaker 1: cytokines in the m r n A episode and they
Speaker 1: are helpful, but they can also overblow things quite a
Speaker 1: bit because they run around activating all sorts of other
Speaker 1: immune cells UM and basically say go, go go. And
Speaker 1: so the idea is that this triggers inflammation, and inflammation
Speaker 1: seems to a huge problem for all sorts of things,
Speaker 1: everything from neurological disorders to um to arthritis, to UH
Speaker 1: irritable bowel syndrome to to basically anything that can be
Speaker 1: wrong with you seems to have some sort of basis
Speaker 1: and inflammation, like your body's mounting in immune response and
Speaker 1: you're suffering as a result. And so that's what the
Speaker 1: idea is with this, that these UM cytokines actually travel
Speaker 1: through the placenta and have an impact on the neurodevelopment
Speaker 1: of the fetus, and that that is what causes autism UM.
Speaker 1: So that it's traced back to this the to the
Speaker 1: guts ability to trigger the immune system, which is another
Speaker 1: whole thing that has you know, it has even wider
Speaker 1: implications than UM than autism spectrum disorder to like, it
Speaker 1: can trigger all sorts of other problems. UM. It might
Speaker 1: not even have to do with the developing fetus. It
Speaker 1: can happen within you, like it can cause UM cytokines
Speaker 1: to to travel up to your brain and produce neurological disorders,
Speaker 1: and you as well mental health issues. And you as
Speaker 1: well that that the gut and inflammation happening in a
Speaker 1: bad combo is is nade good for the average human.
Speaker 1: They're finding, that's right. You mentioned psychobiotics before the break.
Speaker 1: This is the idea that you can again use something
Speaker 1: like probiotics to treat anxiety or depression. And uh they
Speaker 1: have had a little bit of um good fortune with
Speaker 1: with the results here, and it looks like, I mean,
Speaker 1: they're doing some of this on humans, a lot of
Speaker 1: those in rats. I think in two thousand eleven they
Speaker 1: studied both rats and humans and they gave them uh
Speaker 1: strains of bacteria for about thirty days, lacto Bacillus helveticus
Speaker 1: and UH Beefidobe that's the same one from before the
Speaker 1: feto Bacterium long hum. They should just name these, Yeah,
Speaker 1: exactly this column by their pet name, like Lacto and Biff,
Speaker 1: those two old friends. It's right, they really are too.
Speaker 1: They seem to. They pop up a lot where it's like, no,
Speaker 1: this is what you want. Like if you look at
Speaker 1: probiotic supplements almost across the board, you're gonna find Lacto
Speaker 1: and Biff in there. Yeah, Lacto and Biff, the two,
Speaker 1: the two we love to eat. But they've then put
Speaker 1: these people and mice through stress test and found a
Speaker 1: quote significant reduction and anxiety like behavior in the rats
Speaker 1: and actual psychological UM distress was being alleviated in humans
Speaker 1: as well. Yeah, I mean there's that there. This is
Speaker 1: where we're we're what we're moving towards now is treating
Speaker 1: mood disorders, neurological disorders, mental health issues, UM, a whole
Speaker 1: host of physical maladies, chronic diseases UM with with probiotics.
Speaker 1: If you can figure out what's missing in these patients,
Speaker 1: then you can grow that bacteria and put them in
Speaker 1: the person through like pills, and it's possible they'll clear
Speaker 1: it up. Another UM theory of where autism comes from
Speaker 1: is that there's a depleted gut where there's there's bacteria
Speaker 1: that's missing from the person. And they found in my
Speaker 1: studies they are able to produce germ free mice chuck
Speaker 1: and they they those germ free mice tend to exhibit
Speaker 1: the autistic um uh symptoms. Um that when they treat
Speaker 1: them with with probiotics, that those autistic symptoms tend to
Speaker 1: clear up, which is pretty amazing. Yeah, it almost it
Speaker 1: doesn't almost seem like like what is definitely happening. As
Speaker 1: science has progressed over the years, it feels like it's
Speaker 1: become way way less segmented. Um, it's like, here's here's
Speaker 1: your brain, and here's your nervous system, and here's your
Speaker 1: organs and here's this stuff, and it's all compartmentalized, and
Speaker 1: it just seems like through our own research over the years,
Speaker 1: everything is linked together. It seems like, yeah, there's a
Speaker 1: whole um, a whole field called functional medicine that's developing
Speaker 1: that gets super poop pooed by skeptics, and um, it's understandable.
Speaker 1: It's a very early field and there are plenty of
Speaker 1: practitioners who overdo it in in what they say that
Speaker 1: that can be accomplished, But the the whole idea behind
Speaker 1: it is is it's integrated with another name for it
Speaker 1: is integrative medicine. Where, um, you you don't like one
Speaker 1: of the first things you would do when somebody came
Speaker 1: in with a problem, no matter what it was, adjust
Speaker 1: their diet to a healthier diet and start there. Because
Speaker 1: this idea of like the there's your part of a big,
Speaker 1: interconnected whole, that that's how our bodies function. Um, it
Speaker 1: seems intuitive to me now, you know. Yeah, I mean
Speaker 1: Emily goes to a functional medicine doctor, uh, in addition
Speaker 1: to our our regular m d um. It's it's sort
Speaker 1: of it doesn't have to be a one or the
Speaker 1: other thing. Ideally, I don't ideally they worked not together together,
Speaker 1: but they won't even speak to one another. But as
Speaker 1: a patient, ideally they worked. You can work with both,
Speaker 1: is what I'm saying. Yeah, you just don't tell them
Speaker 1: about each other. She is as as you know, is uh,
Speaker 1: suffering through lime right now. I didn't know that. Oh no, oh,
Speaker 1: I didn't tell you that. No, man, that's terrible. Yeah,
Speaker 1: it's been a bad scene at the house for a while. Uh,
Speaker 1: but her her diet is one of the big She's
Speaker 1: on this crazy weird awful diet, nothing but goat milk. No,
Speaker 1: but lots of weird like forest floor tea and just
Speaker 1: stuff that you know, not able to eat. I mean
Speaker 1: you name it. Man, So many things that she can't
Speaker 1: have right now. Uh, to try and help it out
Speaker 1: because you know, the antibiotics they put her on, we're
Speaker 1: wrecking her. Well. Yeah, that's another thing too, is they're
Speaker 1: figuring out that antibiotics to treat just you know rando
Speaker 1: stuff or like the flu or something like that, that
Speaker 1: that can have a huge, terrible effect on your gut
Speaker 1: chemistry and can have cascading effects down the road. There's there.
Speaker 1: That's say, another thing that they're just kind of in
Speaker 1: the initial studies of it. It's not not in any
Speaker 1: shade on antibio aotics. They basically have saved more lives
Speaker 1: than can be possibly counted, but that but we have
Speaker 1: tended to kind of lean toward prescribing them willy nilly,
Speaker 1: and people don't finish their their prescription anyway. So there's
Speaker 1: all sorts of problems with it. But they're finding like
Speaker 1: there's a lot of less less than obvious problems that
Speaker 1: can come about from killing off your gut microbiome. Totally.
Speaker 1: So there's one last thing I want to end with
Speaker 1: real quick, Chuck. One of the guys, the guy who
Speaker 1: actually um along with it, a guy named Ted Deanan,
Speaker 1: coined the term psychobiotics and psychobiome, which is a description
Speaker 1: of how your microbiome produces neurotransmitters like serotonin and dopamine
Speaker 1: and all that that. Um. His his name is John Crying,
Speaker 1: and he has a theory of why, uh, we would
Speaker 1: have evolved to have a microbiome that would impact whether
Speaker 1: we're social or not, because it's weird if you think
Speaker 1: about it. Why would your your gut microbio biome b
Speaker 1: being off like this biotic have any impact done social socialization? Right? Yeah,
Speaker 1: I mean this is super interesting. And the Ted talk
Speaker 1: is uh, it's a Ted med It's it's awesome if
Speaker 1: you have time to go watch it. A little heavy,
Speaker 1: but good stuff. Um. His theory he basically studied the
Speaker 1: same germ free mice that you were talking about that
Speaker 1: have they basically don't have a microbioma of their own.
Speaker 1: Very sad uh, and he's he found out that these
Speaker 1: germ free mice showed a lot of social impairment, especially
Speaker 1: the male mice, and He compared that to the uh
Speaker 1: GERM free mice two symptoms of a s D and
Speaker 1: found that it also affected males. So again that got
Speaker 1: him thinking kind of like what's going on with this stuff?
Speaker 1: So he said, I wonder if like having a healthy,
Speaker 1: sociable human is dependent on that gut bacteria, with the
Speaker 1: idea being that we're all hanging out together in groups,
Speaker 1: you know, tuk tuk in the gang, and we're trading
Speaker 1: bacteria with one another. We're in close contact with one
Speaker 1: and other and swapp and spit with one another, so
Speaker 1: our bacteria is more varied basically, and that's how it's
Speaker 1: selecting that as a positive trade. Yeah, And from the
Speaker 1: bacteria standpoint, the more humans there are around, the more
Speaker 1: hosts you have to colonize, the more the bacteria species thrives. Right,
Speaker 1: So it's like, uh, it's beneficial either way. Like we
Speaker 1: actually get a lot out of being social, Like we
Speaker 1: have longer lifespans, we have a better outlook on life,
Speaker 1: the more like close friends and support network we have.
Speaker 1: It's just been documented over and over again, and it
Speaker 1: seems to be like the more we look into the
Speaker 1: microbiome and the psychobiome that that is driven by bacteria
Speaker 1: that seem to make us more social through their byproducts
Speaker 1: that they make that travel to our brain. Is that
Speaker 1: circular loop again? Yeah? Yeah, so win win is another
Speaker 1: way to put it, and I love them. Uh, you
Speaker 1: got anything else for now? Nothing that's super significant? Okay, Well,
Speaker 1: if you want to know more about the psychobiomego why
Speaker 1: John Crying's Ted med Talk and also UM check out
Speaker 1: on Science the Journal Sciences website, Meet the psycho Biome.
Speaker 1: It's a really good introduction to UM. And since I
Speaker 1: said it's a really good introduction too, it's time for
Speaker 1: a listener mail. I'm gonna call this from listeners in
Speaker 1: the in their seventies. We love to hear from our
Speaker 1: listeners that are even older than me. It makes me
Speaker 1: feel good. Hey, guys, my wife and I love your podcast,
Speaker 1: and this I think is just a bit of a
Speaker 1: reminder for us. I've been listening UM for years now
Speaker 1: every afternoon while playing Spite and Malice. Do you know
Speaker 1: what that is? It sounded really familiar and I didn't
Speaker 1: have time to look it up because that emails just
Speaker 1: came in right. Yeah, this is hot off the precess.
Speaker 1: We're both in our seventies and love learning things we
Speaker 1: still don't know. But this email is to mention to
Speaker 1: both of you lately that your childhood vocal or religious
Speaker 1: vocabulary his upticks some just reminding you that young people
Speaker 1: around the world are listening and the word use brain
Speaker 1: framing is occurring bigly. We suggest for your consideration to
Speaker 1: stay with secular language like CE for the current era. Uh.
Speaker 1: We used, we used to DeVault the CE. I guess
Speaker 1: we kind of have flap back a little bit. Heavin'tly.
Speaker 1: I hadn't noticed. I wonder if we didn't in the
Speaker 1: folklore episode because they were just referenced folklore and we
Speaker 1: just ran the folklore select recently, so maybe they're maybe
Speaker 1: they're thinking, like that's a current episode. Oh that's my guess. Okay,
Speaker 1: it's your guess, is that we're on it. I feel
Speaker 1: like we're on it. I didn't. I hadn't noticed anything
Speaker 1: like that. I feel like we've said BC recently. I
Speaker 1: think you're talking about the headache powder, Okay, which I love.
Speaker 1: We suggest you use secular language like CE for this
Speaker 1: current era. For example, and explaining historical timelines and science
Speaker 1: miracles or humicles as we call them. Uh, and science
Speaker 1: is miraculous in its own right, with all credits to the
Speaker 1: the amazing human beings who discover the actuality of our
Speaker 1: natural universe. Thanks for what you do, keep them coming.
Speaker 1: This is from Andre and Meredith Ryland in Pensacola, Florida.
Speaker 1: Thanks a lot, Andrea and Meredith. We appreciate you guys
Speaker 1: writing in and if you want to be like those
Speaker 1: two and write in yourself, well we want to hear it.
Speaker 1: Send us an email to Stuff podcast at i heeart
Speaker 1: radio dot com. Stuff you Should Know is a production
Speaker 1: of I Heart Radio. For more podcasts my heart Radio,
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