Thursday, January 16, 2014

Maybe We Should Say Thanks?

The human body is a super organism, a complex ecosystem of human cells living in a symbiotic relationship with 100 trillion microbes, collectively called the human microbiome. This microbiome is packed full of friendly microbes called mutualists. Which, actually provide us with some pretty important things.


Without bacteria present, the immune system remains half asleep.
  
Key Roles from our Microbial Friends:

Digestion: They provide enzymes that allow us to get 10-30% more energy (calories) from our diet, improve our absorption of vital dietary nutrients, tune the acidity of our stomachs to the optimum and can also determine our tendency towards obesity. 

Vitamin production: Microbes provide essential vitamins that we don’t have the capacity to make ourselves.

Brain function: Research has indicated that the nature of the gut microbiome influences communication in the brain and mood.

Kidney function: Microbes can impact our tendency to form kidney stones.

Healthy skin function: Microbes on the skin work with the immune system to maintain healthy skin and keep out pathogenic microbe strains.

The BodyEcology Course course offered by the IBA provides more fascinating information on this hot topic.
Click here for more info.