Bacteria from the intestine can enter the brain

Living in our intestinal bacteria can reach the brain. The perpetrators of this discovery, scientists still don’t know how microorganisms overcome the blood-brain barrier.

There is a saying that man is what he eats. She appeared over 150 years ago, but only now scientists have figured out to what extent this saying is true. Researchers have obtained the first evidence that residing in the human brain, the bacteria got there via the bloodstream from the intestines. Made accidentally on the basis of the analysis of brain dead people are already calling the discovery of a stunning and revolutionary. Scientists from the University of Alabama was originally just going to assess the differences in the brains of mentally healthy people and schizophrenics.

If the presence of intestinal bacteria in the brain will be confirmed by other studies, it marks a whole new direction in science, koto is doing a study on how bacteria affect the brain. The fact that the brain is firmly protected by the blood-brain barrier, which blocks any foreign substance can penetrate into the body. This is why many drugs for effects on the brain, which are introduced into body by injection, are almost ineffective – they can’t break through this barrier. And now it turned out that bacteria from the gut in some way his crack.

Experts call it a new molecular factory that has its own needs. It is known that gut bacteria affect our overall health by controlling weight, the risk of certain diseases and even affecting anxiety and depression. The intestinal microbiome is sometimes called the second brain due to its ability to influence mood. But now research has shown that the same bacteria can affect not only the intestine but also in the real brain, traveling through the bloodstream. (READ MORE)