Getting Better With A Little Help From Our 'Micro' Friends
Sunday, June 1, 2008 - 21:28
in Biology & Nature
A naturally occurring molecule made by symbiotic gut bacteria may offer a new type of treatment for inflammatory bowel disease, according to scientists at the California Institute of Technology. The 100 trillion bacteria occupying the human gut have evolved along with the human digestive and immune systems for millions of years. Some harmful microbes are responsible for infection and acute disease, while "other bacteria, the more intelligent ones, have taken the evolutionary route of shaping their environment by positively interacting with the host immune system to promote health, which gives them an improved place to live; it's like creating bacterial nirvana," says one of the researchers.