Benefits of Gut Bacteria

[Jhanananda]

Gut Bacteria May Play a Role in Autism, this may suggest that other kinds of mental illness may be alleviated by cultivating healthy gut bacteria.

Autism is primarily a disorder of the brain, but research suggests that as many as nine out of 10 individuals with the condition also suffer from gastrointestinal problems such as inflammatory bowel disease and “leaky gut.” The latter condition occurs when the intestines become excessively permeable and leak their contents into the bloodstream. Scientists have long wondered whether the composition of bacteria in the intestines, known as the gut microbiome, might be abnormal in people with autism and drive some of these symptoms. Now a spate of new studies supports this notion and suggests that restoring proper microbial balance could alleviate some of the disorder's behavioral symptoms.

[Jhanananda]

Microbes in the Gut Are Essential to Our Well-Being

Antony van Leeuwenhoek wrote to the Royal Society of London in a letter dated September 17, 1683, describing “very little animalcules, very prettily a-moving,” which he had seen under a microscope in plaque scraped from his teeth. For more than three centuries after van Leeuwenhoek's observation, the human “microbiome”—the 100 trillion or so microbes that live in various nooks and crannies of the human body—remained largely unstudied, mainly because it is not so easy to extract and culture them in a laboratory. A decade ago the advent of sequencing technologies finally opened up this microbiological frontier. The Human Microbiome Project reference database, established in 2012, revealed in unprecedented detail the diverse microbial community that inhabits our bodies.

Most live in the gut. They are not freeloaders but rather perform many functions vital to health and survival: they digest food, produce anti-inflammatory chemicals and compounds, and train the immune system to distinguish friend from foe. Revelations about the role of the human microbiome in our lives have begun to shake the foundations of medicine and nutrition. Leading scientists, including those whose work and opinions are featured in the pages that follow, now think of humans not as self-sufficient organisms but as complex ecosystems colonized by numerous collaborating and competing microbial species. From this perspective, human health is a form of ecology in which care for the body also involves tending its teeming population of resident animalcules.

Microbiome Research May Soon Pay Off Big

Genes and Microbes Influence One Another, Scientists Find

Engineering the Human Microbiome Shows Promise for Treating Disease

Hunter–Gatherers Have Diverse Gut Microbes

Like Genes, Our Microbes Pass from Parent to Child

New Drugs May Come from Microbes in Our Guts

[Jhanananda]

The more I learn about the health benefits of Gut Bacteria, the more I wonder if the antibacterial craze of western civilization is the cause of various diseases, such as diabetes.

Water chlorination

Water chlorination is the process of adding chlorine (Cl2) or hypochlorite to water. This method is used to kill certain bacteria and other microbes in tap water as chlorine is highly toxic. In particular, chlorination is used to prevent the spread of waterborne diseases such as cholera, dysentery, jaundice, typhoid etc.

History

In a paper published in 1894, it was formally proposed to add chloride to water to render it “germ-free.” Two other investigators confirmed this proposal and published it in many other papers in 1895.[1] Early attempts at implementing water chlorination at a water treatment plant were made in 1893 in Hamburg, Germany, and in 1897 the town of Maidstone, England was the first to have entire water supply treated with chlorine.[2]

Permanent water chlorination began in 1905, when a faulty slow sand filter and a contaminated water supply led to a serious typhoid fever epidemic in Lincoln, England.[3] Dr. Alexander Cruickshank Houston used chlorination of the water to stem the epidemic. His installation fed a concentrated solution of chloride of lime to the water being treated. The chlorination of the water supply helped stop the epidemic and as a precaution, the chlorination was continued until 1911 when a new water supply was instituted.[4]

The first continuous use of chlorine in the United States for disinfection took place in 1908 at Boonton Reservoir (on the Rockaway River), which served as the supply for Jersey City, New Jersey.[5] Chlorination was achieved by controlled additions of dilute solutions of chloride of lime (calcium hypochlorite) at doses of 0.2 to 0.35 ppm. The treatment process was conceived by Dr. John L. Leal, and the chlorination plant was designed by George Warren Fuller.[6] Over the next few years, chlorine disinfection using chloride of lime were rapidly installed in drinking water systems around the world.

Biochemistry

As a halogen, chlorine is a highly efficient disinfectant, and is added to public water supplies to kill disease-causing pathogens, such as bacteria, viruses, and protozoans, that commonly grow in water supply reservoirs, on the walls of water mains and in storage tanks.[12] The microscopic agents of many diseases such as cholera, typhoid fever, and dysentery killed countless people annually before disinfection methods were employed routinely.[

Drawbacks to water chlorination

Disinfection by chlorination can be problematic, in some circumstances. Chlorine can react with naturally occurring organic compounds found in the water supply to produce compounds known as disinfection byproducts (DBPs). The most common DBPs are trihalomethanes (THMs) and haloacetic acids (HAAs). Trihalomethanes are the main disinfectant by-products created from chlorination with two different types, bromoform and dibromochloromethane, which are mainly responsible for health hazards. Their effects depend strictly on the duration of their exposure to the chemicals and the amount ingested into the body. In high doses, bromoform mainly slows down regular brain activity, which is manifested by symptoms such as sleepiness or sedation. Chronic exposure of both bromoform and dibromochloromethane can cause liver and kidney cancer, as well as heart disease, unconsciousness, or death in high doses.[15] Due to the potential carcinogenicity of these compounds, drinking water regulations across the developed world require regular monitoring of the concentration of these compounds in the distribution systems of municipal water systems. The World Health Organization has stated that the "risks to health from these by-products are extremely small in comparison with the risks associated with inadequate disinfection."

[Jhanananda]

Fiber-Famished Gut Microbes Linked to Poor Health

[Jhanananda]

You Should Know: Kristina Campbell and The Intestinal Gardener

[Jhanananda]

How Modern Life Depletes Our Gut Microbes

Looks like many of us don't have the right stomach for a paleodiet. Literally.

Two studies give us a glimpse into our ancestors' microbiome — you know, those trillions of bacteria that live in the human gut.

And the take-home message of the studies is clear: Western diets and modern-day hygiene have wiped a few dozen species right out of our digestive tracts. One missing microbe helps metabolize carbohydrates.

[Jhanananda]

I found this article speculative, but interesting nonetheless, The Tantalizing Links between Gut Microbes and the Brain

Studies on community outbreaks were one key to illuminating the possible connections. In 2000, a flood in the Canadian town of Walkerton contaminated the town's drinking water with pathogens such as Escherichia coli and Campylobacter jejuni. About 2,300 people suffered from severe gastrointestinal infection, and many of them developed chronic irritable bowel syndrome (IBS) as a direct result.

During an eight-year study of Walkerton residents, led by gastroenterologist Stephen Collins at McMaster University in Hamilton, Canada, researchers noticed that psychological issues such as depression and anxiety seemed to be a risk factor for persistent IBS.