Documentary: The Hunt for a Better Gut Bacteria in Central Africa
Dr. Klara Petrzelkova from the Institute of Vertebrate Biology and the Institute of Parasitology, Biology Centre, participated in an expedition to Central Africa with the aim to understand the microbiome of the hunter-gatherers. The HBO video has a quatre million views within a month".
Powerful antibiotics and widespread sanitation practices have expanded lifespans across the industrialized world. But they have also come at a cost. Our microbiomes, or the trillions of microbes collectively working in our bodies to help regulate our immune system and food digestion, have lost much of its health-promoting bacteria because of our modern lifestyles and sanitation practices.
Scientists across the world are now looking to the planet's few remaining pre-industrialized societies to see what industrialized guts have lost--and in doing so, could fundamentally change the way scientists think about germs. Thomas Morton heads to the Central African Republic to see this emerging field of microbiome science.
