🥤 Microplastics is everywhere, especially in human bodies.

Experts are beginning to explore the effect of accumulation in the body.

• Brain-lodged microplastics create behavioral problems and inflammation in mice.

• Concentrations in stools of IBS patients were significantly higher than average.

• Particles were found in every placenta tested, with unknown effects on maternal and fetal health.

• Microplastics were present in 58% of patients undergoing carotid artery surgery.

🥊 Punchline

Tiny particles seep into the environment, contaminating our food and water supply. Our world is becoming more polluted, , meaning basic human needs—like fresh air and safe sustenance—will sadly become premium products.

🦠 We have been told modern diet is bad for us. This is a reason why.

Fibre is good for us, but humans are losing the microbes that can turn fibre into food (so essential for a healthy digestive tract!).

A study revealed how only certain bacteria - named Ruminococcus - turn fibre into something useful that feed an entire gut community.

But the Western culture is taking its toll on our microbiome.

Diet is changing in industrialized societies and this shift away from a fibre-rich diet is an explanation for the loss of important fibre-degrading microbes.

Basically, ‘if you don’t use them, you lose them’.

🥊 Punchline

Fibre in the gut is like a tree-trunk in a river; it gets wet, but it does not dissolve. That’s why we need specialised gut bacteria to turn fibre into something useful for our health. But as modern diet has little fibre, we are slowly losing this superpower.

🧠 Craving snacks after a meal? No, we don’t have a second stomach!

People who find themselves raiding the fridge for a snack after a filling meal might have overactive food-seeking neurons, not an overactive appetite or a second stomach.

Psychologists have discovered a circuit in the brain associated with panic.

When triggered, this pushes mice to forage vigorously and to prefer highly rewarding, high-caloric food even in the absence of hunger.

Humans also possess the same cluster of cells in the brain stem. It could be that if this circuit is overactive, humans might feel more rewarded by eating or crave food when not hungry.

Conversely, if this circuit is not active enough, they could have less pleasure associated with eating, potentially contributing to anorexia.

🥊 Punchline

This is big news as the food-seeking circuit could become the treatment target for certain eating disorders.