A Community of Thousands -- In Your Gut

Audio

11/21/2008

Nov. 21, 2008

A Community of Thousands -- In Your Gut

Click

to enlarge images

New work published this week indicates that the human intestines may be home to over 5,600 different bacterial species and strains. Some of those species are harmful, some are harmless, some are essential to life -- and some are somewhat of a mystery, never before being cultured in the lab.

In this segment, we'll learn about new studies that take a census of just what lives inside your gut. We'll also hear about what happens when the gut bacterial community is hit with a dose of antibiotics. Writing in the journal PLOS Biology, a team of researchers reports that people being treated with the antibiotic ciprofloxacin may have the bacterial communities in their intestines altered for weeks or even months. We'll talk about why the researchers think that's significant.

Produced by Annette Heist, Senior Producer

Guests

David Relman
Professor of Medicine, and of Microbiology and Immunology

Stanford University School of Medicine

Chief of Infectious Diseases

Veteran's Affairs, Medical Center Palo Alto

Stanford, California

Discussion

WAYS TO LISTEN

BLOG

ABOUT

Science Friday® is produced by the Science Friday Initiative Science Friday® and SciFri® are registered service marks of Science Friday, Inc. Site design by Pentagram; engineering by Mediapolis.