Image: Brian Stauffer
In Brief
Moody Microorganisms
- Bacteria and viruses dwelling in our gut produce compounds that can interact with our nervous system in ways that appear to affect our anxiety and stress responses.
- Early clinical trials suggest that bacterial remedies, such as probiotic supplements, may be useful in treating several types of psychological distress.
- Eventually individual assessments of gut microbial communities could allow physicians and researchers to tailor treatments for mental disorders.
The thought of parasites preying on your body or brain very likely sends shivers down your spine. Perhaps you imagine insectoid creatures bursting from stomachs or a malevolent force controlling your actions. These visions are not just the night terrors of science-fiction writers—the natural world is replete with such examples.
Take Toxoplasma gondii, the single-celled parasite. When mice are infected by it, they suffer the grave misfortune of becoming attracted to cats. Once a cat inevitably consumes the doomed creature, the parasite can complete its life cycle inside its new host. Or consider Cordyceps, the parasitic fungus that can grow into the brain of an insect. The fungus can force an ant to climb a plant before consuming its brain entirely. After the insect dies, a mushroom sprouts from its head, allowing the fungus to disperse its spores as widely as possible.
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10 Comments
Add CommentMy gut sent me here.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisMy brain is telling me to reject this nonsense, but my gut tells me there may be something to this...
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisWe're all just dung for some other life-form
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisMore reason to keep our minds out of the sewer.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisThis adds to a slew of great microbe theories getting more notice in recent weeks. Others include that humans and their bugs now represent a single super-organism, and that the complex part of our immune system did not evolve to fight invading pathogens. That talent may have been a lucky aftereffect of its more ancient role: managing the bugs our vertebrate ancestors "invited" in to help us better digest more kinds of food.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisI've always thought "probiotics" is garbage because different people have different diets and different ancestral adaptations. It does however, make sense that you are literally what you eat and what you eat is based on what your gut bugs need to nourish you. I look forward to more information and possibly the chance to ditch the array of pharmaceuticals I currently depend on. I'd have to see a lot of proof before I'd be willing to risk it though.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisI suggest reading the book Body Ecology Diet for more info on microbes-of-the-gut and how they work with the systems of the human body.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisWhat happens when a cat refuses to eat a T. gondii infected rodent?
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisHow do cats behave around humans?
How do humans behave around God?
Ever think that religion is the result of T. gondii infections?
awesome response!!!!!!!!!!!!!
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to this"I'd have to see a lot of proof before I'd be willing to risk it though."
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisHaving attended medical school, knowing the studies that are the basis for medications prescribed nowadays, I think you should apply your same logic to those medications, considering the great potential for harm with them. Probiotics are harmless at worst. Actually, we prescribe probiotics quite regularly these days in almost all hospitals to prevent GI infections. If the gut is healthy, often the patient heals as well.