What You Need to Know About Age-Related Muscle Wasting
By E. Dylan Mayer I have talked about frailty in a previous post, emphasizing the importance of shifting dietary habits and adopting a regimen of regular physical exercise. This same advice stands true for age-related muscle wasting, or sarcopenia. Sarcopenia is the loss of muscle mass and function, and frailty can be defined as multi-system […]
Why Is It So Hard to Adopt a Diet to One That Is Good for Our Health and the Planet?
It’s More Than Just Dirt!
By Juliette Frank As scientists and environmental organizations constantly remind us of the dire future we are heading towards if we don’t substantially decrease greenhouse gas emissions, it feels more and more like we are doomed. Trying to grasp the degree of large-scale change necessary to halt and try to reverse the rate at which […]
The Wellness Primer, Part II
Do Loneliness and Wisdom Really Affect Our Gut Microbes?
The Remarkable Benefits of Flexible Problem Solving
By Jeffrey Lackner, PsyD The past 20 years has seen an explosion of research on non-drug treatments for painful medical disorders including irritable bowel syndrome (IBS). Disorders that were once seen as untreatable are now regarded as treatable. Hope has replaced helplessness. One particularly exciting area is the use of a specific behavioral treatment called […]
3 Habits of the Healthy and Happy
By Nicole Winhoffer For 10 years, I’ve worked with the most prestigious performance artists, Oscar-winning directors and actresses and top CEOs in the world, whom I like to consider, all, top athletes. We prepare, train, practice and repeat, to reach their optimal excellence. We perform each day, asking our minds, bodies and spirits to execute […]
The Wellness Primer
Solutions for PMS (And What Gut Health Has to Do with It!) Part Two
By Selin Bilgin Welcome back! I hope you found value and are already feeling better from following the recommendations I gave in my last blog post on Solutions for PMS. I’m thrilled to share with you even more steps for you to implement to have a better menstrual cycle. The impact of targeted nutrition and […]
Managing Our Mental Health in the Midst of the Pandemic
By Ariel Suazo-Maler Over the last year, we have collectively gone through a reeducation process surrounding best ways to ‘take care’. While the pandemic caused us to immediately focus on how to support our physical well-being, we quickly understood that ‘health’ included taking care of our mental wellness. “Bringing awareness to best practices and understanding […]
Your Happiness Makes Me Happy
By Amanda Gilbert In mindfulness meditation there is a traditional practice called mudita, or appreciative joy. Mudita is the heart-based practice of feeling joy and happiness for others, and celebrating their happiness, good fortune and success. While mudita may be a lesser-known practice in modern times, it is one that can have great influence over […]
Is Long COVID the New Chronic Fatigue Syndrome?
Microbiome and Aging
By E. Dylan Mayer I recently came across an article in the NYTimes titled, A Changing Gut Microbiome May Predict How Well You Age. The article talks about the gut microbiome and its role in healthy aging. The author quotes a new study published in the February issue of the journal Nature Metabolism which found […]
Probing the Brain Gut Microbiome Connection at UCLA’s Division of Digestive Diseases
The Link Between the Microbes in Our Gut, in the Soil and Our Diet
The Elusive Mechanism Underlying a Runners’ High
4 Myths About Mindfulness and Meditation
By Suzanne Smith, RN, NP Thirty years ago, when I was living in Asia, some friends invited me to meditate. There was no formal instruction, simply watch your breath. I waited and waited, and nothing happened. My mind was just as active as ever and I was not moving into any state of deep relaxation […]
The Importance of Time-Managing Stress
By Jill Horn We all know that chronic stress, regardless if it is psychological or physical stress, is bad for our body and mind. But recent evidence suggests that the timing of the stressful experience during a 24 hour period also plays an important role in determining its effect. Based on both pre-clinical and clinical […]
Meeting Our Difficulties with Self-Compassion
By Amanda Gilbert One of my first mindfulness meditation mentors would often say, “usually we don’t begin a meditation practice because everything is going well in our lives.” The first few times I heard this it felt alarming and almost too honest. As a longtime meditation teacher now myself, I think back to my mentor’s […]
The Science Behind Anti-inflammatory Diets
Futuristic Food Boom
By Juliette Frank “The Plant-Based Meat Substitute Have Scaled-up Into One of the Fastest Growing Markets in the Food Tech Industry.” With growing awareness of the negative health and environmental impacts of the meat and dairy industry there has been a growing demand for alternative protein sources in the past few years, making room for […]
The Mind-Gut Connection: Nutritional Psychiatry
By E. Dylan Mayer As stated in an article from Harvard Health, your brain functions like a high-performance vehicle – it works best when it gets premium fuel. The logic behind this view is that eating high-quality foods packed with vitamins, minerals, polyphenols, fiber and healthy fats will help protect your brain from oxidative stress, […]
A Sign of France’s Culinary Shift
By Juliette Frank “France is known for its haute cuisine filled with meat-laden dishes.” For anyone working in the restaurant industry, chefs, and foodies alike understand the value of a Michelin star. For more than a century, the French tire company has been publishing annual restaurant reference guidebooks which award up to three Michelin stars […]
What is All the Craze about Plant-Based Meat Substitutes?
Brain Balancing Act
By Nicole Winhoffer NW Method was created to help artists like Madonna, Kate Hudson, and Stella McCartney to achieve optimal health through connecting their mental, emotional, spiritual, and physical body. Total health cannot be achieved without connecting all parts of the human body. Many fail to realize that the physical body is a representation of […]
Destigmatizing Mental Health
By Ariel Suazo-Maler The conversation surrounding mental health maintenance is a loaded one. While society is moving in a less stigmatized direction when it comes to sharing feelings, diagnoses, and modes of taking care, we still have not achieved complete de-stigmatization. “A silver lining of the prolonged lockdown” With the announcement of a lockdown coming […]
Solutions for PMS (And What Gut Health Has to Do With it!)
By Selin Bilgin Are you a gal who dreads that time of the month, or have someone in your life that suffers from PMS? My hope is that you will be delighted at how simple it can be to bring your body back to balance with today’s article and relieve yourself of challenging PMS symptoms. […]
Living with Intention
By Amanda Gilbert From a mindfulness perspective, there are two ways to go about living our lives. One is to go through life with the awareness of what we’re actually doing, saying, thinking, feeling and creating, while the other, is to live without practicing present moment awareness. The downside of the latter, more common approach […]
Transcending the Illusion of Separateness – A Path of Healing for People and the Planet
By Goli Gabbay As a mental health and wellness expert as well as an environmental consultant and educator, I have always felt a powerful connection between our well-being and the well-being of the planet. Knowing that what we do to nature and animals, we do to ourselves, I dedicated two parallel career paths weaving together […]
When Does Keto Make Sense?
By Jill Horn “The keto diet has successfully been applied in the treatment of treatment-resistant seizures, type 1 and type 2 diabetes, and metabolic syndrome.” The ketogenic diet (“keto diet”) has recently received increased attention from the general public as well as the scientific community.1 The proposed benefits include weight loss, improved metabolic regulation, reduced […]
Is Gut Health Related to COVID-19 Risk and Severity?
What Does Biodiversity Have to Do with Our Health?
By E. Dylan Mayer I recently read an interesting article by Markham Heid online that talked about the relationship of being in close proximity to the natural world and the health of our microbiome, and our own health. “It is not surprising that we are now living on a planet that is in turmoil, and […]
A Mindful Approach to Better Health
By Jill Horn Mindfulness describes a non-judgmental approach to life and a focus of attention on the present moment associated with an approach to the present experience with an attitude of openness.1 Further fundamental components of mindfulness include a shift in our attention on the breath and on bodily sensations. As discussed in Suzanne Smith’s […]
The Exercise-Gut Connection
By Juliette Frank It is well known that regular exercise is a key part of a healthy lifestyle due to its many health benefits such as assisting in weight control, reducing inflammation and risk of heart disease, and increasing antioxidant defenses. As more evidence on the importance of the gut microbiome on overall well-being continues […]
The Mind Body Connection
By Nicole Winhoffer Let’s talk about mind-body connection. If you are reading this post, then you know very well that there is a connection between your mind and gut. Did you know you have more brain neurons in your stomach than your brain? In the same way that the body affects the mind, the mind […]
Do We Need the US Government’s Advice on a Healthy Diet?
Exercise, The Miracle Drug
By E. Dylan Mayer Levels of anxiety, stress and depression are at all-time highs during the COVID-19 pandemic, and there is little doubt that this compromised state of our mental wellness will continue into the next year. Many of us are in lockdowns, unable to gather with family & friends during the holidays and feeling […]
It’s Not All About WHAT You Eat, It’s About WHEN You Eat
By Juliette Frank The recent publication of a number of studies on the benefits of time-restricted eating (TRE) on losing weight and improving overall metabolic health has led to an increased interest in the topic. As TRE and intermittent fasting (IF) gets pushed into mainstream discussion, a common question people have is if it is […]
The Remarkable Health Benefits of Abdominal Breathing
By Suzanne Smith, RN, NP 2020 has been a challenging year to say the least. We have all been impacted significantly and many of the resources we rely on for our well-being are not available. Most gyms and studios are closed, it is not safe to gather in groups and most of us are working […]
Two Simple Changes for Better Metabolic Health
By Jill Horn The body, and in particular the brain gut microbiome axis are complex systems with all parts being in constant bidirectional communication with each other through multiple feedback loops.1 The behavior of such complex systems is characterized by regular fluctuations or oscillations, which are a measure of the health of the system. On […]
Optimism and Cardiovascular Health
The Okinawa Diet
How Important Are Dietary Supplements for Our Health?
Life Out of Balance
The Truth About Superfoods
As Far as Fish Are Concerned, Smaller Is Better
By E. Dylan Mayer This article was inspired by Patagonia Provisions’ journal found here. Even though the majority of people have stuck to their traditional habit of enjoying red meat as their main protein source, in the last 40 years, an increasing number of Americans have been moving away from red meats and transitioning towards […]
Why Do Humans Continue to Eat Meat When It Is Not Good for Us
A Personal Experience from 2 Months of Time-Restricted Eating
Treating Chronic Gastrointestinal Symptoms with Digital Therapeutics
Are Probiotics Good for You?
The Magic Weight Loss Diet Does Not Exist
Is Frailty Inevitable As We Age?
Challenging the Dietary Guidelines on Dairy
Nurturing Your Gut Microbial Health During the Lockdown
Does the Gut Microbiome Play a Role in the Individual Response to the COVID-19 Virus?
The Health Benefits of Green Tea
Do the Benefits of Organic Food Justify the Increased Cost?
Plant-Based Milk Alternatives – Which One to Choose?
Health Benefits of Red Meat: How Much Can We Trust Food Recommendations in Medical Literature?
The Indisputable Benefits of Largely Plant-based Diets
Microbes Adapt to Their New Environment Along with Their Immigrant Hosts
Can the Iceman Tell Us Something About the Healthiest Diet?
Lessons Learned from the Gut Microbiome of Hibernating Brown Bears
Pain Summit
HEALING CHRONIC PAIN SUMMIT “There is, most likely, at the current stage of our knowledge, a programming phase early on that makes the brain more vulnerable later to develop a chronic pain syndrome.” Join thousands who are registering to watch this online summit with 47 leading experts. In this summit, we acknowledge and recognize that […]
Important Implications for Development of Future Therapeutic Strategies Using Engraftment of Microbial Species Into Our Gut Microbiome
An exclusive metabolic niche enables strain engraftment in the gut microbiota Elizabeth Stanley Shepherd, William C. DeLoache , Kali M. Pruss , Weston R. Whitaker & Justin L. Sonnenburg After programming of the general compositional architecture of the gut microbiota in early life, the established microbial ecosystem remains fairly stable and resilient to perturbations throughout […]
Fascinating study reporting results obtained from nearly 12,000 people around the world as part of the American Gut Project
‘Largest’ microbiome study weighs in on our gut health Fascinating study reporting results obtained from nearly 12,000 people around the world as part of the American Gut Project. Major findings of this landmark study are the fact that it is the diversity of plant based foods that a person consumes (and not just the fact […]
Indisputable Health Benefits of the Traditional Mediterranean Diet
IBS Patients Obtain Robust, Enduring Relief from Home-Based Treatment Program–And Physicians Agree
“This study clearly established the clinical value of a #MindBased intervention for Irritable Bowel Syndrome (IBS)… showing that this should be offered to patients not as a last resort but as a safe and effective first or second-line therapy.” – Dr. Emeran Mayer Landmark, NIH-funded multisite study finds IBS patients who learned to control severe […]
The Germs That Love Diet Soda
The “National Eating Disorder” Epidemic and What You Can Do About It
In this excellent summary by Mark Bittman and David L. Katz about what you need to know about healthy nutrition, the authors address some of the most commonly asked questions that I get from patients and audiences around the country. Some people may disagree with some of these recommendations, but overall, I cannot think of […]
Chronic Stress Is Bad for Your Gut Microbes
Psychosocial stress has long been known to affect the gut as well as its microbial residents. More than 10 years of research in rodents, monkeys, and human subjects have shown that even mild stress can transiently reduce the abundance of certain types of microbes, including the lactobacilli in the stool of the animals. In chronic […]
The Effect of Physical Exercise on Our Gut Microbiome
A large body of scientific evidence supports the fact that physical exercise is good for cardiovascular and brain health. In particular, a previous study from Ireland comparing professional rugby players and sedentary healthy control subjects suggested that exercise increases short chain fatty acid production by gut microbes and thereby improves your gut health.1 However, as […]
Putting Your Mind Back into Food
As health-conscious consumers, we are constantly concerned about finding the healthiest foods in the market. We perform calorie counts of our meals and worry that we may not get enough protein, vitamins, calcium or other minerals. Millions of people with a syndrome called non-celiac gluten sensitivity spend a lot of their attention and money on […]
Why the Mediterranean Diet Is Good for You
If you want to stay healthy, slim, maintain your cognitive function, and live longer, there is no question that sticking to a traditional Mediterranean-type diet is the best investment you ever make. As diet fads come and go (including high fat, paleo, vegan, and ketogenic diets) there is a consistent flow of studies that confirm […]
Do All Diseases Start in the Soil?
According to recent science summarized in a blog post by Anne Bikle and David Montgomery published in Nautilus and discussed more extensively in their book “The Hidden Half of Nature,“ the answer is a definitive yes. The authors describe not only the astonishing interconnectedness between what we feed our plants and how these plants feed […]
Caveats to the Ketogenic Diet
If you listen to the proponents of the ketogenic diet, everybody should be increasing their consumption of animal products, particularly red meat and animal fat, while restricting the intake of processed carbohydrates such as sugar. There is no question that the scientific literature supports the effectiveness of ketogenic diet in rapid weight loss and in […]
Has Gluten-Free Failed You? Here’s What To Do Next
I just posted a blog on Medium together with my friend and colleague Dr. Steven Tan. The last time we co authored a paper was in 2015 entitled Traditional Chinese medicine based subgrouping of irritable bowel syndrome patients. This time our joint article is related to food, more specifically about how to design a personalized […]
The Western Meditation – Is It A Mere Stress Reduction Technique?
If you have ever observed longtime meditators in a Buddhist monastery, or gone through rigorous meditation training yourself, you know that meditation is a serious business and has been for thousands of years. Dedicated meditators strive towards compassion, equanimity and enlightenment, and do not pursue their practice with the simple goal of stress reduction and […]
Finding Your Optimal Diet in a World of Food Sensitivities
The many iterations of food sensitivities in the “national eating disorder” community never cease to amaze me! While the topic of non celiac gluten sensitivity (NCGS) has occupied the headlines for several years now, and has resulted in millions of people demonizing gluten containing food, the latest research study from Norwegian investigators is challenging the […]
The Food Revolution
Amongst the many dramatic technology- driven changes such as self driving electric cars and artificial intelligence going on in the world we live in, the Food Revolution is happening almost unnoticed. While the majority of people living in the US and many parts of the world continue to stick to their traditional Western diet consisting […]
Sensory Deprivation for Relaxation
I am always amazed how things that first became popular in the 60’s and 70’s as counterculture or “new age” beliefs and practices like organic food, vegetarianism, sustainable agriculture, meditation, and even the use of psychedelic drugs like ketamine (now evaluated as a miracle drug for refractory depression) have returned, this time as mainstream businesses. […]
Sex as a Biological Variable: NIH Workshop
The NIH held a workshop on the topic “Sex as a Biological Variable” recently. Women make up half of the world’s population, but the great majority of medical research studies have been performed in males. It has erroneously been assumed that the results and recommendations from these male only studies equally apply to women. In […]
A Miracle Weight-Loss Molecule?
An interesting study describing the development and testing of a molecule first identified in obese laboratory animals and humans, which appears to play a role in modulating the brain-gut axis in a way to prevent further weight gain. The scientists at the pharmaceutical company Amgen modified the molecule so it stays in the circulation longer […]
Vegetarianism May Be Linked To Depression, Study Suggests
This large and well designed clinical study performed in men confirms results previously reported from surveys in women by showing that people who identify themselves as vegetarians or vegans are more likely to be depressed. Previous studies had shown that such an increased risk also applies to anxiety disorders. Like all published studies, the current […]
Is The Secret To A Healthier Microbiome Hidden In The Hadza Diet?
Even though they represent different races, live in very different parts of the world with different climates and plants, the few remaining hunter gatherer tribes in the world – including the Hazdas in Tanzania, the Yanomamis in Venezuela and the Asmat people in Irian Jaya – they have one important thing in common: their gut […]
The Human Microbiome: Emerging Themes at the Horizon of the 21st Century
There is an impressive assembly of the leading microbiome scientists attending the conference “The Human Microbiome: Emerging Themes at the Horizon of the 21st Century” which has been going on at the Natcher Conference Center on the National Institutes of Health (NIH) campus. The presentations about the latest analytical and computational techniques makes it clear […]
Detox: Does it Help Our Brain-Gut Health?
People love the concept of “detox” and a lot of different strategies such as juicing and fasting, and “cleansing” have been proposed to achieve this goal. Even though the concept goes back thousands of years, most are based on unsubstantiated pseudoscientific concepts that “cleansing” your digestive tract has health benefits over and beyond a general […]
American Psychiatric Association (APA) Meeting 2017
I was invited to speak at the Annual Meeting of the American Psychiatric Association (APA) recently in a debate addressing the question: Can Gut Microbiota Affect Mental Illness? The event was organized by Erika Nurmi, MD from the Semel Institute at UCLA and had a prestigious panel of discussants including James McCracken, MD (UCLA), Chadi […]
Gut Microbiome Symposium in Brisbane
I just spoke at an international microbiome symposium sponsored by the Falk Foundation and organized by Dr. Gerald Holtmann in Brisbane, Australia. The conference highlighted the rapid progress that is being made in identifying the role of the gut microbes in a wide range of disease areas, including inflammatory bowel diseases, IBS, rheumatoid arthritis, pulmonary […]
Leading the Fight Against Excess Sugar Consumption
I was recently invited by Professor William McCarthy from the UCLA School of Public Health to participate in an Expert Roundtable on Added/Free Sugar at the Luskin Center at UCLA. The meeting was sponsored by the Kaiser Permanente Policy Institute in partnership with the American Heart Association and hosted by Drs. Sue Babey and William […]
The Brain-Gut-Microbiome’s Connection to IBD, Obesity and Anxiety/Depression
In the last 5 days I spoke at scientific meetings in NYC, New Orleans and UCLA on each of these topics. The growing interest in the topic of brain gut communication by specialists working in very different areas of research would not have been imaginable only a couple of years ago! Question 1: What do […]
Antibiotic Use and Inflammatory Bowel Disease
A couple of days ago I attended an interdisciplinary brainstorming workshop sponsored by the Crohn’s and Colitis Foundation (CCFA) in New York City which began at the storied Harvard Club of New York and went on in a nearby hotel. Experts from widely different disciplines from environmental sciences, microbiology, neuroscience and gastroenterology pondered for 9 […]
The Korean Diet
During my recent trip to Korea, I had a first hand opportunity to experience a food culture which to a large degree is based on fermented foods. While the controlled fermentation of food evolved thousands of years ago as a technique to preserve and store vegetables and fish to be enjoyed fresh months later, there […]
16th World Congress on Pain in Yokohama
Who would have thought a few years ago, that our gut microbes may have an influence on the development of chronic pain? However, the exponential growth in interest of the scientific world in the gut microbiome in the last few years has made it possible to address this provocative question and provide intriguing data supporting […]
Nestlé Nutrition Institute Workshop 2016
I am attending the 88th Nestlé Nutrition Institute Workshop in Mexico “Intestinal Microbiome: Functional Aspects in Health and Disease” and gave a presentation yesterday on brain gut interactions and behavior. There is a growing consensus that the early life period is crucial for the programming of the gut microbiome. This starts during pregnancy with maternal […]
Gut Check
Jon Meachan’s article about Donald Trump in this week’s edition of TIME magazine, is entitled Gut Check – For Trump, intuition beats experience. No matter how much you believe that Mr. Trump lacks any intuitive or experiential qualification to become the next US President, the article raises an important point. Political and military leaders, investors, […]
3 Things Every Parent Should Know!
The first three years of your life are the most important time to shape the life long dialogue between the gut, its microbes and the brain; and the clock starts even before you are born! From the physical and psychological stress a mother experiences during pregnancy, to what she eats, to the way a newborn […]
Interview with Dr. David Perlmutter: Diet and The Mind-Gut Connection
Microbial Ecology
According to a recent article by Ed Yong in the Atlantic, the entire field of microbiome science has paradigm shifting implications: “If microbiome science tells us anything, it’s that everything is secretly ecology. The biology of oceans and bodies and soils is really about the connections and relationships between living things, many of which have […]
Launch of the National Microbiome Initiative and its Implications for All of Us
The launch of the National Microbiome Initiative (NCI) was announced on Friday, March 13 at the White House. Several members of the UCLA Microbiome Center attended the event which brought together scientist, industry representatives and funding agencies. The NMI has three major goals: To foster interdisciplinary research on fundamental questions about diverse microbiomes (including soil, […]