Diet and mental health

[Music] [Sound] [Sound] one of the most important implications  that has had the study of the interaction   between the intestine and the brain are the clinical  clinical implications not and in particular because   those that are related to what is the neurology, the  neurology the diseases that are related to   with neurological alterations and this has been very revolutionary in the world of neurology

  very revolutionary in the neuroscience world

   because diseases such as for example Alzheimer's disease was considered until very recently   solely and exclusively of neuronal origin and  is one of the diseases whose research   has been more disturbed by everything that is the interaction  is the interaction of the brain with the rest of the   the organs one of the bases that has then  the interaction of the microbiota with it with   the intestine and its clinical application is that the microbiota regulates  microbiota regulates a lot of the production of the   neurotransmitters are those hormones that are exchanged  neurons exchange with each other in order to transmit information are responsible for the deficit or surplus  surplus of some of the neurotransmitters   that underlie many of the diseases such as schizophrenia schizophrenia acute depression   attention deficit disorder or even to a different  to another degree also alzheimer's disease   then what has been seen for example is that  diets rich in fiber promote the generation of   of neurotransmitters such as serotonin

  serotonin has been known as the hormone of the   happiness because it is behind what are the highest emotional  higher emotional processes, one of the most important   great points of research today is to try to measure  trying to measure what is that vitality and I think it's a   I like very much an interpretation that is being given  in the world of neuroscience and that is to consider the   depression, anxiety and life dissatisfaction that a considerable percentage of people  which has therefore a considerable percentage of the   population as a lack of vitality a study that came out five years ago  study that came out five years ago demonstrated that in cities in   environments in developed countries approximately 80% of the population defines itself as very tired

   this is worrying because defining oneself as very tired  as very tired means because of their chronic fatigue   it means states of anxiety states of stress  that are chronic that is to say lack of vitality the   lack of vitality has been very much related to  an alteration in the microbiota has been recognized as the   very recently, almost three years ago, a new medical term  new medical term which is dysbiosis dysbiosis   what it is intended to measure is the imbalance  that we have in our microbiota more or less because   we all have to have the same percentage the same composition of bacteria and yeast in our microbiota

   our intestine but there are people who have a deficit of some of them  have a deficit of some of them study the   alterations or what is the imbalance in our microbiota  imbalance of our microbiota can give us clues about the   what factors are influencing in this lack of vitality  vitality in this chronic fatigue that we are talking about

   complaint because a large percentage of the population then as I was saying the neurotransmitters are modulated the generation   or directly generate certain neurotransmitters  one of the most important avenues of research development   that you're seeing today is trying to figure out what neurotransmitters  trying to decipher which neurotransmitters and which   what percentage of their production depends on diet

  diet I have to say that at this point in time it's something that is   is being studied it is true that there are many  studies supporting some diets supporting others   to stop taking some foods versus others  but as of today at least to the best of my knowledge   it's all still very much up for debate you have to think  that this is a field that is very young that is very   growing that are being investigated that everything is going at a dizzying speed but I think that   we still need to be a little bit more cautious when it comes to scientifically  when it comes to scientifically support a diet against   to another one, what all the scientific studies seem to agree  scientific studies this diverse diet because   is related to a diversity of our microbiota and  microbiota and the diversity of the microbiota is   always related to a general health and within what is the application of the clinical studies   of the relationship between the gut and the brain

  if I had to stay with one that has been   especially favored is in the autistic spectrum  so three years ago it came out I have published in a journal   a treatment based on fecal transplantation and the consumption of   certain probiotics caused a 50% remission of autism spectrum symptoms

  symptoms of autism spectrum disorder that seems to be   little because it was one of the major milestones that had been  had been achieved at the time and this opened   also and popularized the use of fecal transplants this is one of the things not that has been more   media but that are revolutionizing the world of  the world of psychology of psychiatry which has   is in fact because recently the last ten years fiscal banks have started to emerge  years have begun to emerge fiscal banks and what   means that as we know our microbiota we can study the microbiota  microbiota we can study the microbiota that we   our gut through a stool analysis because we can't study our  stool analysis because we can't access   directly into the microbiota without being invasive  with the person so what we do is we do that   there are people that are donors of these feces and there are  banks that receive stool sometimes to select the   healthy components of a microbiota that's healthy those in those components what it does is that   they are inserted into a person obviously via well in the  nasal gas and they do when they get to the intestine they repopulate the microbiota and causes the person to restore their microbiota  to healthy levels of microbiota in the   fecal transplantation is being used today for example for acute  for example for acute depression that has become drug resistant

the autism spectrum and another one of the research  that's being done that I think is very important for   promising is to study the change in the microbiota inferring through the microbiota in the early   stages of alzheimer's disease alzheimer's disease has different  alzheimer's disease has different stages   that go from mild cognitive impairment to the development of alzheimer's  to the development of alzheimer's disease

   there are people in mild cognitive impairment that do not progress to  progress to alzheimer's disease this is one of them

   of the objects one of the target populations  of studies because we are trying to see what   biomarkers that we can do in those early stages of alzheimer's disease so that   the disease does not degenerate then one of the hypotheses that we have is that in Alzheimer's disease what we can do in   that we find is that in the brain  is filled with plaques that are called Alzheimer's plaques

   beta amyloid plaques is like residues that have been deposited in the  that have been deposited in the brain and protein tangles

   tau like skeins of dust literally because they are small pieces of protein structures that are being released

   and they were producing a skein and those skeins are deposited  those skeins are depositing those balls and those plaques are being   deposited in different parts of the brain

  what we are trying to do is that those plaques are not deposited   there to eliminate them but above all that they are not deposited  deposited, one of the studies that are being carried out is to   that looks like it might be more promising is how through the diet in those early stages   to reduce the deposition of those plaques

  another one of the factors that has a very strong influence not in   the in the development of Alzheimer's disease  but also for example brain damage   acquired an is not the neuroinflammation when  we have an episode to an alteration   neuronal there is a neuronal inflammation  the microbiota seems to be behind the   immune system then the immune system is the one that controls  that controls also the inflammatory processes   of the body is also being studied as  through the intestinal microbiota we can   make the inflammatory processes to attenuate the inflammatory processes  so this is another one of the avenues and going back not to   what hippocrates was saying the working through the microbiota is opening up  the microbiota is opening many, many doors   a lot of implications in the world of mental health in the world of  in particular in the world of neurology

[Sound]