The tantalizing links between gut microbes and the brain

Abstract

A growing body of data, mostly from animals raised in sterile, germ-free conditions, shows that microbes in the gut influence behaviour and can alter brain physiology and neurochemistry. 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. In 2007, for example, Francis Collins, now director of the US National Institutes of Health, suggested that the Human Microbiome Project, a large-scale study of the microbes that colonize humans, might help to unravel mental-health disorders.; A growing body of data, mostly from animals raised in sterile, germ-free conditions, shows that microbes in the gut influence behaviour and can alter brain physiology and neurochemistry. 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. In 2007, for example, Francis Collins, now director of the US National Institutes of Health, suggested that the Human Microbiome Project, a large-scale study of the microbes that colonize humans, might help to unravel mental-health disorders.;