Showing posts with label PopSci. Show all posts
Showing posts with label PopSci. Show all posts

Sunday, August 19, 2012

The Potential Role of Our Microbiome Ecosystems

For those who like these pop-sci articles on the still somewhat conjecture-like but very inspiring theories about the role of our intestinal microbiome in health and disease, here's a link to an article from The Economist (18 AUG 2012):

The Human Microbiome: Me, myself, us

And let me reiterate: We still don't know much about mikro-eukaryotes in all this... do they play a role as well? And how do they cope with different types of microbiomes?

Anyways, enjoy!

Monday, June 25, 2012

Microbiome Blog Posts

Here's a couple of interesting blog posts on the microbiome, some of which also expand a bit on the hygiene hypothesis:

10 Ways the Human Microbiome Project Could Change the Future of Science and Medicine
"By treating our microbiomes like ecosystems — equipping it with the resources it needs to sort itself out rather than attacking it, guns blazing — some researchers hope to usher in a new way of thinking about our relationship with bacteria and other microorganisms." - Find it here.

Human microbiota and atherosclerosis
Data adding to the infection hypothesis of atherosclerosis; find it here.

Are Your Gut Bacteria Vegetarian?
Examples of how differences in diets may be associated with differences in gut microbiota. Find it here

Gut Flora, Probiotics and Vitamins A + D - Do they influence Allergy and Autoimmunity?
"For over 30 years data has been building to scientifically support the hypothesis that intestinal cohabitants operate in a collective manner with macro and micro food intakes to shape and define our immune systems from an early age." - A post including an updated version of the hygiene hypothesis and a bit on faecal bacteriotherapy as well... go here

The Healthy Human Microbiome
 - from "NIH Research Matters". Very general, but with some other links too, - read it here.

How Bacteria Break Down Human Food
Read about the carbohydrate metabolising abilities of bacteria living in different anatomical sites of your body here.

Dirtying Up Our Diets
More about the possible explanation for the alarming rise in allergic and autoimmune disorders in NY Times,  go here.

More from NY Times, this time by Carl Zimmer:

Our Microbiomes, Ourselves
Using bacteria as living drugs against obesity, autoimmune diseases and intractable GI infections...  find it here.

And - for the more hardcore fanatics - thanks to Jonathan Eisen (@phylogenomics) who writes the blog "The Tree of Life" - here's a collection of many of the recent papers and news stories concerning the human microbiome project (HMP).

And finally - to top it off:

Microbiome analysis helps understand cause of chronic sinus condition, suggests cure
They found that patients with chronic rhinosinusitis (chronic inflammation of the paranasal sinuses) had a depleted nasal microbiome, characterised by a significant reduction in bacterial diversity and an overgrowth of one type of bacteria, Corynebacterium spp. + Lactobacillus depletion. Presented at ASM2012. Read it here.

And for those who think that I have been disgressing lately, - I'll be back with more on Blastocystis in my next post - look out!

Friday, April 13, 2012

Blastocystis @ EzineArticles

I realise that output from my research ends up being read/noticed by only relatively few people compared to the number of individuals colonised by Blastocystis (!) This is due to the fact that research results are published in a language and context not always easily understood by laymen, and that few of my articles are available online free of charge.

This is part of why I created this blog. And  now I also have the pleasure of recommending a Blastocytis article on EzineArticles: Blastocystis - Everyone's Parasite?

Please share.