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Enhancing gut-brain communication reversed cognitive decline in aging mice

med.stanford.edu

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Re: Enhancing gut-brain communication reversed cognitive decline in aging mice

#11

Post by 1shooner »

inanutshellus wrote: post #9

Everyone's "poo-pooing" the article because the title doesn't mention mice, but, FWIW, stories of gut biota affecting humans behavior have been documented for a while. Memory gain is noteworthy, which is the article's "wow" factor, but everyone's just knee-jerk smirking so ... here's a few random articles to gross you out about the wild world of trading microbiota and, for better or worse, changing your personality:…

This seems to be a recent anti-science meme to dismiss studies that use mouse models. I'm sure there is an interesting line of discussion about the strengths and limits of those models, but that's probably a complex, nuanced thread to pull, not something you blow off with a hand-waving internet comment.

Re: Enhancing gut-brain communication reversed cognitive decline in aging mice

#12

Post by inanutshellus »

1shooner wrote: post #11
inanutshellus wrote: post #9

Everyone's "poo-pooing" the article because the title doesn't mention mice, but, FWIW, stories of gut biota affecting humans behavior have been documented for a while. Memory gain is noteworthy, which is the article's "wow" factor, but everyone's just knee-jerk smirking so ... here's a few random articles to gross you out about the wild world of trading microbiota and, for better or worse, changing your personality:…

This seems to be a recent anti-science meme to dismiss studies that use mouse models. I'm sure there is an interesting line of discussion about the strengths and limits of those models, but that's probably a complex, nuanced thread to pull, not something you blow off with a hand-waving internet comment.

To some degree the other posts are just pointing out the misleading "assumed protagonist" of the title (which doesn't mention mice) but I was surprised to see that the majority of posts boiled down to "eek! mice!"

Re: Enhancing gut-brain communication reversed cognitive decline in aging mice

#13

Post by seethishat »

IMO people should eat more fiber. A lot more fiber. It cleans the gut, the liver, absorbs cholesterol, slows insulin response and makes you feel full longer. The microbes in our guts need it to function.

Rather than jumping from one fad diet to another, just eat what you like and be sure to get a lot of fiber each day.

Re: Enhancing gut-brain communication reversed cognitive decline in aging mice

#14

Post by mustaphah »

Yeah, it's a mouse study, but there are tons of human studies backing the whole gut-brain connection. There are even a bunch of books on it [1][2].

What's really cool is that the paper used low-dose capsaicin (just 5 μg/kg injected), and it completely restored hippocampal FOS activity and memory in older mice. Basically, that's the same stuff you get in cayenne pepper supplements - pretty easy to get your hands on.

[1] https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/28837738-the-mind-gut-co...

[2] https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/35210457-the-psychobioti...

Re: Enhancing gut-brain communication reversed cognitive decline in aging mice

#15

Post by j45 »

vidarh wrote: post #6
j45 wrote: post #4

Earlier quoted context omitted.

in mice is clearly in the subhead. The connection between gut-brain has been studied in humans, as well as the effect of diet and gut bacteria on brain functions.

And in this case it sounds like the pathway to determining if this has an effect in humans as well might be relatively short given there is a pool of patients receiving vagus nerve stimulation for other things that might provide data.

Vagus Nerve treatments also exist as well and are highly observable.

Re: Enhancing gut-brain communication reversed cognitive decline in aging mice

#16

Post by jstanley »

seethishat wrote: post #13

IMO people should eat more fiber. A lot more fiber. It cleans the gut, the liver, absorbs cholesterol, slows insulin response and makes you feel full longer. The microbes in our guts need it to function. Rather than jumping from one fad diet to another, just eat what you like and be sure to get a lot of fiber each day.

> eat what you like and be sure to get a lot of fiber each day

Sure sounds like another fad diet.

Re: Enhancing gut-brain communication reversed cognitive decline in aging mice

#17

Post by IshKebab »

maxall4 wrote: post #5

I smell bad data. This sounds too good to be true and most studies of this kind have turned out to be false a few years down the line. Edit: one of many examples: https://www.science.org/content/article/journal-retracts-inf...

It doesn't seem to link to any data at all so we can't check, but I wouldn't be entirely surprised if they used the "standard" P=0.05.

I think for something this unexpected you'd want a much lower P.

Re: Enhancing gut-brain communication reversed cognitive decline in aging mice

#18

Post by memonkey »

seethishat wrote: post #13

IMO people should eat more fiber. A lot more fiber. It cleans the gut, the liver, absorbs cholesterol, slows insulin response and makes you feel full longer. The microbes in our guts need it to function. Rather than jumping from one fad diet to another, just eat what you like and be sure to get a lot of fiber each day.

The post is about a scientific study and your response is your opinion with nothing else to back it up?

Re: Enhancing gut-brain communication reversed cognitive decline in aging mice

#19

Post by nomel »

jstanley wrote: post #16
seethishat wrote: post #13

IMO people should eat more fiber. A lot more fiber. It cleans the gut, the liver, absorbs cholesterol, slows insulin response and makes you feel full longer. The microbes in our guts need it to function. Rather than jumping from one fad diet to another, just eat what you like and be sure to get a lot of fiber each day.

> eat what you like and be sure to get a lot of fiber each day Sure sounds like another fad diet.

The charitable interpretation is "just eat more fiber, regardless of the rest"

Re: Enhancing gut-brain communication reversed cognitive decline in aging mice

#20

Post by jimkleiber »

inanutshellus wrote: post #9

Everyone's "poo-pooing" the article because the title doesn't mention mice, but, FWIW, stories of gut biota affecting humans behavior have been documented for a while. Memory gain is noteworthy, which is the article's "wow" factor, but everyone's just knee-jerk smirking so ... here's a few random articles to gross you out about the wild world of trading microbiota and, for better or worse, changing your personality:…

There was a South Park episode about this years ago where everyone was trying to get it from Tom Brady.
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