Kiran Krishnan  “ Your Friendly Bacteria are your Greatest Health Ally”

Kiran is a self- confessed geek who has been researching the gut microbiome for the last 12 years, working at product development and clinical research. He has worked in the microbiology/ food safety area for 20 years. He wants to understand the role bugs play in wellness. He has 11 human clinical trials on his probiotic formulation going on currently. The  vast majority of probiotics on sale are based on assumptions that a collective effect is of benefit, when only the individual probiotics have been studied, whilst the combination of several of these in a pill have not been studied. As Kiran says, we don’t know if they compete with each other or are antagonistic to each other. I think his approach is much needed.
Humans are fascinatingly complex large animals. Our bodies can adapt to abuse and just keep on coping and adapting and coping some more. Our brains are particularly amazing.

How is it that humans are so spectacular? In 2007 the human microbiome project was begun with a $150 million contribution of funding by the U.S. government. It’s been found that we use 3.5 million bacterial genes for adaptions including increasing the capacity of our brain. We have incorporated bacterial DNA in a way that prevents disease in a few different ways:  1) by coding for hormones and proteins ( eg serotonin is produced by gut bacteria) 2) by using Micro RNA which can turn off and on genes 3) by bacterial metabolites  our bodies need. Eg cellulase: we eat plants made of cellulose. We can not make the cellulase enzyme to digest them but our colonies of bacteria can. We are omnivores who can eat a whole range of things but often we can only get benefit from them because bacteria in us process and break down the food. We are picking up DNA from new bacteria all the time. Japanese people have developed a capability to digest seaweed thanks to their ingestion of related bacteria with sushi.

Modern life is attacking our microbiome. Think WiFi, antibiotics, food additives (preservatives colours and flavours)  body care and cleaning products  ( shampoos,cosmetics, cleansers and perfumes with rare exceptions are all toxic) and of course the farm chemical residues and GMos in all processed  “foods ”. Birth by C-section means baby does not get inoculated with good bacteria from the parents through the natural birth canal and this is devastating to the child’s future health.  Immunization and formular feeding only further the damage.

Now we are realizing how many diseases are related to a damaged microbiome. Alzheimer’s , Parkinsons diabetes, obesity and mood disorders are the result of a messed up or “dysbiotic” microbiome which can begin a disease process way before the signs of disease show up. For eg every Parkinson’s sufferer had constipation for many years before the neurological symptoms began.

Fecal transplants FT  ( implanting the fecal matter from a healthy person into someone with a chronic illness) have revealed a lot of new information: A very thin lady who ran marathons regularly suffered from colitis. Doctors wanted to perform surgery on her bowel. Someone suggested a FT, which she went ahead with. Her colitis cleared up within a few days but a month later she had gained a lot of weight. On the same diet and the same exercise routines the lady became chubby for the first time in her life. It turned out the donor of the FT was overweight. In another case, a rat received a FT from a patient with Alzheimer’s and autism who walked in circles all day. The rat began to walk in circles all day too. Another patient had a strange gait all his life. A FT cured the palsy and corrected his gait.  Another example involves an autistic child who had no speech. Two weeks after a FT he began speaking normally.

Kiran attends about 45 conferences a year on the microbiome and absorbs and reports on the latest scientific findings. Increasing the diversity of our microbiome is deemed to be most important. This word diversity is popping up everywhere.  Examples from my world:  we are finding that a mix of 17 species of cover crop plants makes a way healthier soil than just 3;  the more diversity in a garden the more resilient it is, the more diverse ingredients in a compost heap the better the compost grows plants.  So the advice is to eat a varied diet. They say that our ancestors ate 400 to 600 types of food throughout the year, while we tend to subsist on about 30 foods, available year round. My personal hunch is that a small range of food types is OK when grown in a very healthy environment , (ie a soil alive with large numbers and great diversity of microbes)  These foods of provenance will be covered in really good bacteria and perhaps  give you the huge diversity of bacteria you require to ingest for health on a daily basis. Why do I think this? Well, Weston A Price on his travels to isolated native people in the early 1900s described incredibly healthy folk in Swiss glacial villages eating only rye bread and cheese and butter for most of the year, but the butter was extremely high in vitamin A. These people had no fruit and vegetables in their diet at all as they lived above the snow line and the summer was very short. They had only a little beef and milk to break the monotony of their cheese and ryebread staples.  He also visited Islands north of Scotland where all that would grow was oats, and the people were again in superb health, on nothing but oats and fish.

Within the M’Biome there seems to be KEYSTONE  species.  A study done on the antibiotic Amoxyllin  showed that an hour after a dose of Amoxyllin, 99% of gut bacteria in humans are decimated.  But after 12 hours the bacteria begin to bounce back.  Of course, the question is what types of bacteria and in what ratios? Usually nasty opportunistic bacteria breed up into large populations in the absence of competition and this is how health problems arise. The researcher very interestingly found that each of many bacteria he incubated individually with the antibiotic survived, but a collection of these different bacteria all died on exposure to the AB. Kiran hypothesizes that there are “key stone” species that are like pillars that hold up and protect the entire microbiome….perhaps they produce metabolites that most of the M’biome use?  So it seems that the M’biome functions as an elaborate ecology, and if you kill some significant species the whole lot collapses. Like if earth worms died out due to climate change, or honey bees became extinct due to pesticides, where would this leave us? Struggling with no wetting soil, raging CC and a very limited diet.

You and I have very different microbiomes because our mother’s gut floras were different. There is only a 30% similarity between people’s microbiomes. One thing that is the same, we are exposed to good bacteria in the environment that have the capacity to survive our gastric systems ( most bacteria coming in do not survive this) and once in the gut, hatch out of their cacoon that may have protected them for  millions of years prior to entry into our mouth. So they hatch in the small intestine and go to work for us. Some of the best bacteria for soil and us are in the Bacillus family.  One example is Bacillus Subtilis. Their natural home is in the gut but out in the environment it forms an endospore, a thick calcified armour, where it may survive the passage of time thorough all sorts of extremes of weather/PH/ Salt concentration, in other words….” Habitat”. Some of these endospores have been found still viable in 250 million year old salt crystals. They have been successfully plated (brought back to living, breeding condition on a petri dish) after all that time. Another Jurassic Park- type event occurred when the stomach contents of a fossilized honey bee encased in amber was drilled out and some organisms were successfully plated after 50 million years.  The amazing powers of bacillus don’t stop there. Kiran went back into war records to discover that the German army fighting in North Africa were being decimated by dysentery. They noticed when the locals started feeling sick they ran and looked for dried camel dung and ate it! They would get better very quickly. Camel dung was sent back to Germany and microbes identified. Bascillus Subtilis was discovered in the dung and found  to be protective against dysentery. It has been marketed  as a cure for dysentery for the last 60 years!   So these Bacillus are like the Jeddhi knights who get through our stomach juices in their protective armour, then  lodge in the duodenum to emerge and fix our gut flora for us. They do a thing called Quorum Sensing …they find over grown and pathogenic bacteria, sit next to them and produce about 25 kinds of antibiotics to kill them off. They then produce substances like prebiotics which breed up the good bugs that are left. These are amazing bugs.

Another keystone pillar species is Bacillus Clausii, a fabulous bacillus which has been around for millions of years also. B Clausii  has been a prescription drug since 1958, it fights salmonella and upper respiratory infections . It very  powerful at boosting  our mucosal immune system . It up-regulates your immune system and fights off bad bacteria and has been marketed in Latin America and Europe since 1958.

Consuming fermented vegetables as in sauerkraut and Kimchee on a daily basis is like taking probiotc pills but far greater numbers and often diversity of bacteria is found  in fermented foods. The  veges  have to be organic to have the lactobacillus on them that starts the fermentation off in the right way. Home made probiotics are cheaper of course than pharmacy pills. Sometimes though, very rare, very beneficial microbes are discovered and put into pills for sale. I may buy some. Getting great sets of organisms given to us by friends such as Haydn Gunningham and Brent Burns was a turning point for our composting operations in the early days, their donations really helped us to make a You Beaut compost forever more, as did collecting a teaspoon of soil from old growth forest, so indeed , why not open up my digestive tract to a potentially wonderful new species which may colonize it and do me a world of good? 

It is also important to consume PRE biotic foods, which contain the indigestible fiber which make it through to our colon to feed the colonies of bacteria which use it for food.  Fermenting this resistant starch , the good bugs turn  it into beneficial acids like butyrate, as mentioned in a previous blog on the Dr Stephen Hawrelak  workshop. Looking at traditional cultures, ( although not many are left) may reveal more practices which boost the microbiome. Indigenous peoples ate a huge range of food and  also did not (or do not ) live in a society that is based around killing bacteria.  Glyphosate is an insane example of this, it is an antibiotic which kills the good bacillus preferentially, but leaves the negative E coli, salmonella and botulism to thrive ( and proliferate they will, as they are unchecked by the absent good guy bacteria ).

Inside us is a surface area 150 times higher than our skin, covered in mucous which is populated by zillions of bacteria. These trap substances coming in from the environment, examine them make decisions : welcome them through, tolerate them or mount a fight ? This first thick band of bacteria living in the mucosal layer are a protective coating for the gut lining, which is only one cell thick ( the lining cells are called epithelial cells) . There is another band of denser, thicker mucous called Mucin 2 right next to the epithelial cells which is devoid of bacteria, it is a “no go zone”. This layer can be broken down by bad bacteria. Dysbiotic flora can make holes between the epithelial cells, and BT toxin from GM corn can make holes right through the cells. In either case we call this condition "leaky gut".

Good bacteria actually feed us the proteins which form tight secure junctions between membrane cells throughout our body. If the epithelial cells sense any bacteria in Mucin 2, or bacterial components or half digested food, clostridia,  toxins  etc near them, they freak out and call up an army to fight them. The ensuing battle causes INFLAMMATION which further destroys the gut lining as collateral damage. Lipo poly saccharides ( LPS) is a toxin produced by pathogenic bacteria, which enters the blood stream and causes a inflammation response.

Chrones disease, irritable bowel disorder and many more digestive disorders are driven by  damage to the mucosal immune system. The genes for the manufacture of the 40 proteins that create tight junctions between the cells are turned off and on by bacteria. The structure of the mucous layer is controlled by bacteria. This bacterial layer is called by Kiran “Ground Zero of disease” because the root cause of the all chronic disease is due to problems in the mucosal layer and tight junctions in the gut.

In a double blind placebo controlled trial  of his probiotic formula they took  normal, healthy, young (av.23 year old) college students in the prime of their lives. Surprisingly 55% of them were found to have leaky gut. The researchers got them to eat a meal (from McDonalds I believe) and soon after measured the inflammatory cytokines in their blood. Chemical markers of inflammation  in the form of 12 kinds of cytokines go through the roof whenever someone with leaky gut eats a meal. "CD 14" activation has now been shown to be the primary driver of many disorders, it sets off the pathology that causes most illness in fact. Traces of CD 4 inflammation marker were still in the  blood of the students with leaky gut 2 weeks later.......it took more than  2 weeks to recover from that one meal. In real life however we keep going though the drive thru….. we keep eating these meals, and the body never recovers.

Kiran asked himself  “Can we ingest a bacteria  that heals and seals the gut lining? If we can do that and stop the flow of toxins into the bloodstream, can we allow the body to recover? ”  In the college students there was a 60% reduction in the inflammation markers after 30 days on the probiotic. No dietary interventions were done in the study.  A month on Kiran’s Probiotic also  led to a  40% reduction of tricglycerides ( liver fat), meaning the liver was not under the same burden as before in  trying to get the triglycerides out of the blood.   On the subject of the liver, there was a study done on rats . They were fed the weakest solution of glyphosate, it was in parts per trillion. The rats developed non alcoholic fatty liver disease ( NAFLD). The FDA and FSANZ (food safety authorities) allow humans to be exposed to levels of glyphosate 470,000 times higher than the levels which gave the rats NAFLD, when adjusted for body weight. NAFLD leads to liver cancer, cirrhosis of the liver etc. The gut permability changed MCP1 , which indicates inflammation in the gut lining. The  scientists  saw a significant reduction in MCP1 after 30 days on the probiotic.

                                                                                                                      

 Inflammatory cytokines are the driver of Parkinson’s, cancer, obesity, diabetes, and so on. Bacillus Subtilis reduced inflammatory markers such as CD 14 cytokines and triglycerides, signalling a significant reduction in mucosal immune response.
Obesity 

Another aspect of the study was they looked at the hormone Ghrelin, the hunger hormone that signals you to eat. It should drop  when the stomach is full . A constant high level of this hormone is linked to obesity. When the students were hungry Ghrelin was measured as “high “which is normal, but a 2000 calorie meal did nothing to drop the Ghrelin level in the student’s blood. After 30 days on the probiotic formula that Kiran is testing,  this hormone  dropped by 50% after eating the same 2000 calorie meal, meaning the communication between the gut and the brain via the vagus nerve seems to have been re-established. Lipopolysaccharide is a toxin produced by bad bacteria and is known to interfere with communication between the gut and the brain, and the ghrelin signals.  Seratonin plays a role here too, because as it increases, this triggers those “stop eating“ signals.

Bacillus Clausii and B Subtilis both work to re- establish regulatory T cells. These cells dampen an over enthusiastic immune response ( the cause of asthma, excema, hay fever and food allergies all the way up to auto immune disease like Lupus, Chrones disease etc) Seratonin production is also stimulated by our champion spore forming bacilli. They also boost populations of another group of good bacteria, the Akkermansia . Akker monitors the outside world . Lean people with low inflammation , good over all immunity , who are at low risk for heart disease and who enjoy longevity have high populations of Akkermansia inside them.
Antioxidants 

One more hero in the good army within is Bacillus Indicus. It is a first class carotenoid producer, meaning it takes your food and turns it into powerful antioxidants like anthocyanins, Luteins, alpha and beta carotein and Astaxanthin.

A whopping  $5 million Euros worth of studies were conducted to  discover the bacteria that produce disease- fighting, bioavailable, very potent antioxidants. 

What’s good about antioxidants?  In the gut , having high levels of Anti-Oxidants there will help us deal with ageing, inflammatory bowel disorders, bowel and other cancers, mental illness, all of which result from oxidative stress. The "apple" or natural  version of these carotenoids is created by Bacillus Indicus. It is  10 X more powerful in terms of its antioxidant capability than the antioxidants available in shops. The apple version as opposed to synthetic versions of carotenoids  is fat soluble and water soluble, which improves absorption by the body. We were told to eat our veges for vitamin A, but in fact  humans are not good at extracting carotenoids from foods….we can eat a ton of carrots but get very little carotenoids from them. However if we have the B Indicus at work within us, we have an antioxidant factory creating potent and bioavailable antioxidants  every day. This is natures hard core antioxidant. It was discovered after looking at pink animals: pink Salmon, flamingos, krill and prawns obtain their eye-catching coloration either by eating  shrimp (which feed on astaxanthin-rich algae, or eating the algae directly.  However they  all turned out to have the Bacillus Indicus  in their gut as well, which produce  so much carotenoids that they are expressed on their skin as bands of orangey pink colour.  

A bit more about  the amazing Astaxanthin: Scientists say that astaxanthin benefits include anti-diabetic, anti-obesity, anti-inflammatory, anti-aging and immune system-enhancing properties, and natural healers may advise it to improve vision, ease joint pain, enhance heart health and even minimize facial wrinkles! The outstanding antioxidant capacity of astaxanthin has been estimated by scientists to be 6,000 times more powerful than vitamin C, 800 times more powerful than the enzyme CoQ10, and 150 times more powerful than anthocyanins (the beneficial bluish-purple pigments found in blueberries). It enhances gap-junction channels and improves the vital ability of healthy cells to communicate with each other -an essential function in inhibiting cancer development.

Researchers say Astaxanthin induces the death of malignant cancer cells. 

Apoptosis is the programmed destruction of damaged or dysfunctional cells. However,  cancer can elude this beneficial process – meaning that its cells can survive and multiply unaffected by apoptosis.Reinstating the mechanism for apoptosis is what we are after, and  studies have shown that astaxanthin promotes apoptosis in both oral and liver cancer cells. 

As Jeffery Smith points out, the number 1 reported improvement or reversal of disease when switching to an organic diet is that digestive health improves. Specific negative impacts of GMOS and Round Up seems to be gut dysbiosis. With the help of star bacilli  the dysbiosis may be able to be reversed.

Mitochondrial health and the ageing process 

Aging is driven by Oxidative Stress. Pathologists looked at cells of a 90 years old and of a 5 year old  and asked “what is the difference between these individuals?” In the 90 year old, 95% of their mitochondria were dysfunctional. When energy (ATP)  is produced from glucose and fatty acids in the mitochondria within each of our cells, a  byproduct is  the formation of  “super oxides” . These are like heat to your car engine. They have to be quenched by antioxidants , which are like the oil in your engine. If the oil is not there, the engine will be destroyed by heat. If anti oxidants are not in the cell, the mitochondrial “engine” may be damaged. Glutathione, peroxidase, and other antioxidants produced by B indicus reduce the damage to the mitochondria. Who knew products of the microbiome help the mitochondria in all our cells?  If we are killing the engines of our cells, lethargy may lead on to  dementia and vascular diseases such  heart disease.

A study in Italy showed that Round Up ready soy beans  fed to mice accelerated  the aging process .

Amongst the 11 clinical trials  being carried out on Kiran’s probiotic product “ Just Thrive” there are studies on acne, gum disease, rheumatoid arthritis , diabetes, and more. The break down in the mucosal lining starts the damage to so many systems in the body, as you can see by this seemingly unrelated list. Thrive probiotic contains the 4 endospores of Bacillus we have looked at above.

I was very impressed with Kiran , he is a real bacteria nerd. If I was going to buy a probiotic off anyone, it would be him. He is showing with study after study that by using these keystone species we can recover from exposure to Round Up. He gives the credit to Nature and says “we are just smart enough to have respect for nature”. Such a different attitude to the Biotech scientists who operate under false assumptions and in ignorance whilst thinking all the while they are clever.  Im guessing you are a bit of a nerd to have made it through this article. Kiran will be publishing studies on the effects of Round Up on the microbiome very soon, and I will be ringside when he announces results. I will pass the findings on to you. Thanks Jeffery Smith, thank you Kiran Krishnan. Please email me for how to order "Just  Thrive" at a special discount. We can share the freight.