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Modern city dwellers have lost about half their gut microbes

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Re: Modern city dwellers have lost about half their gut microbes

#31
post #3

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's not impossible, and it might even be plausible... But it's a really, really difficult question. People outside of science: don't make the mistake of thinking that scientists haven't thought about this before! haha

What is that supposed to mean?

Guessing that this means there are a lot of confounding variables other than gut biome (environment, diet, genetics, etc) that are very difficult to isolate to prove causation, as opposed to correlation.

Re: Modern city dwellers have lost about half their gut microbes

#33

About ten years ago my former PI (second author in the below paper) did quite a job on this in Burkina Faso, analyzing the composition of the gut in children living outside cities, in cities, and a comparison with European children. Obligatory disclaimer: I was working in his laboratory at the time, but I wasn't involved in that research. https://www.pnas.org/doi/10.1073/pnas.1005963107

What's a "former PI"?

[deleted]

Re: Modern city dwellers have lost about half their gut microbes

#34

About ten years ago my former PI (second author in the below paper) did quite a job on this in Burkina Faso, analyzing the composition of the gut in children living outside cities, in cities, and a comparison with European children. Obligatory disclaimer: I was working in his laboratory at the time, but I wasn't involved in that research. https://www.pnas.org/doi/10.1073/pnas.1005963107

What's a "former PI"?

No post body was provided.

Re: Modern city dwellers have lost about half their gut microbes

#35

About ten years ago my former PI (second author in the below paper) did quite a job on this in Burkina Faso, analyzing the composition of the gut in children living outside cities, in cities, and a comparison with European children. Obligatory disclaimer: I was working in his laboratory at the time, but I wasn't involved in that research. https://www.pnas.org/doi/10.1073/pnas.1005963107

[deleted]

Re: Modern city dwellers have lost about half their gut microbes

#36

About ten years ago my former PI (second author in the below paper) did quite a job on this in Burkina Faso, analyzing the composition of the gut in children living outside cities, in cities, and a comparison with European children. Obligatory disclaimer: I was working in his laboratory at the time, but I wasn't involved in that research. https://www.pnas.org/doi/10.1073/pnas.1005963107

What's a "former PI"?

"Principal investigator". Roughly a research group leader.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Principal_Investigator

Re: Modern city dwellers have lost about half their gut microbes

#37

About ten years ago my former PI (second author in the below paper) did quite a job on this in Burkina Faso, analyzing the composition of the gut in children living outside cities, in cities, and a comparison with European children. Obligatory disclaimer: I was working in his laboratory at the time, but I wasn't involved in that research. https://www.pnas.org/doi/10.1073/pnas.1005963107

What's a "former PI"?

The former "Principal Investigator" of the (research) project. Often the professor who is responsible for obtaining the grant and driving progress

Re: Modern city dwellers have lost about half their gut microbes

#38
post #20

Does anyone know of probiotics with a variety of bacteria? Currently they (and yoghurts) seem to be just a single type, which doesn't make a lot of sense to me. If there are unusual bacteria out there where do they come from and how can we get them? I've done a bunch of anti-biotics in the last few years so what to get back to what I was.

I started taking these a month ago. They’ve worked wonders for my IBS: Healthspan Super20 Pro 60 https://www.amazon.co.uk/dp/B085632HRB

Re: Modern city dwellers have lost about half their gut microbes

#39
post #20

Does anyone know of probiotics with a variety of bacteria? Currently they (and yoghurts) seem to be just a single type, which doesn't make a lot of sense to me. If there are unusual bacteria out there where do they come from and how can we get them? I've done a bunch of anti-biotics in the last few years so what to get back to what I was.

A quick search turned up this one that claims to have 12 strains of bacteria. It is also USP verified. I'm not an expert and have never tried it, but hopefully that info helps.

https://www.costco.com/trunature-advanced-digestive-probioti...

Re: Modern city dwellers have lost about half their gut microbes

#40
post #13
post #5

>people in U.S. cities...people in less developed parts of the world What about people in the US who are not in cities? That's the more interesting comparison to me. Why would that be left out?

I'm curious why that comparison is more interesting to you? I can see great value in having both data points when trying to formulate a hypothesis about what causes the decline in gut-microbes in us city folks, but I find it hard to think of a use-case for solely a urban/rural comparison without other context. (Update: I was thinking about this from a scientific perspective, ignoring the idea that people might be int…

I shouldn't say more overall, but the difference among people who have a similar diet and circumstances, but differ by housing culture, would be interesting to observe. I'd like to see apples to apples, if indeed the theorized reason of where gut differences come from is strictly (or mostly) urban vs. rural. Is it that country people are around more dirt, or that city people have different stressors, or maybe both are included? It'd be easier to tell if other differences are eliminated, imo. I've long preferred country life, having spent roughly half of my life in cities and the other half in the country, so maybe some personal interest is there too, to be honest. I do feel a lot healthier living in the countryside, perhaps my gut has something to do with that.
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