Scientists Find Bacterial Zoo Thrives in Our Skin

Scientists Find Bacterial Zoo Thrives in Our Skin

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Eeeww. There's a zoo full of critters living on your skin — a bacterial zoo, that is. Consider your underarm a rain forest. Healthy skin is home to a much wider variety of bacteria than scientists ever knew, says the first big census of our co-inhabitants. And that's not a bad thing, said genetics specialist Julia Segre of the National Institutes of Health, who led the research.

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The NIH's "Human Microbiome Project" is cataloguing the bugs on healthy skin - so far, about 1000 species on average.

People's bodies are ecosystems, believed home to trillions of bacteria, fungi and other microbes that naturally coexist in the skin, the digestive tract and other spots. But scientists don't have a good grasp of which microbes live where, much less which are helpful, even indispensable, in maintaining health. The NIH's "Human Microbiome Project" aims to change that, recruiting healthy volunteers to learn what microbes they harbor so scientists can compare the healthy with diseases of microbes gone awry — from acute infections to mysterious conditions like psoriasis or irritable bowel syndrome.

The skin research, published in Friday's edition of the journal Science, is part of that project. Scientists decoded the genes of 112,000 bacteria in samples taken from a mere 20 spots on the skin of 10 people. Those numbers translated into roughly 1,000 strains, or species, of bacteria, Segre said, hundreds more than ever have been found on skin largely because the project used newer genetic techniques to locate them.

We have evolved in cooperation with the microbes that live on the earth, in our bodies and on our skin.

As these microbes mutate and evolve, so will we. The first sign seems to be "disease," but I'm (fairly) convinced that this is but one step along the evolutionary path.


www.google.com
(visit the link for the full news article)

One of the most interesting evolutionary paths is illustrated by flesh-eating disease - MRSA, or methicillin-resistant Staphylococcus aureus. As I recall, staph has always been quite common, and not long ago was relatively benign.

By mid -2007, mutation and evolution had changed all that...

Superbug "MRSA" Now Transmitted Sexually

It causes pus-filled boil-like sores, bleeding lung abscesses and flesh-eating disease, and it's called community-acquired methicillin-resistant Staphylococcus aureus (ca-MRSA). MRSA used to be only acquired in hospitals. Recently, it escaped into the community and is spreading around the world. Transmission was thought to occur with skin-to-skin contact, without abrasion, and with indirect contact with contaminated objects like towels, sheets, and sports equipment. Now, "Clinical Infectious Diseases" investigators from New York report that "Community-associated MRSA can be regarded as a sexually transmitted disease."

Awesome post Sofi!

I always understood somehow there was more to life on my body than anything else. I dont bathe as often as other people and I am as healthy as a horse. Where as I know people whom are obsessed with disinfecting themselves and they are sick very routinely.
Star and Flag!

[edit on 5/28/2009 by Tentickles]

reply to post by Tentickles


I choose to bathe every two to three days (four if my time is strained) and NEVER with antibacterial soap! I have had this notion that the bacteria on me are beneficial, stemming from an early study into the likelihood that this is so. It was back in the '60's, I think, and the report was that we needed to have these critters for health.

I seem to be holding up fairly well...

Save the rain forest, don't use anti-bacterial soap!

Seriously, wasn't that common knowledge for the last say, 200 years? Is the next step to find bacteria on another planet? That would be much more impressive.

Way to justify your non-use of the shower all of those years isnt it? hahaha
I shower daily, and I am healthy as a jay bird(Knock on wood).

reply to post by Tentickles


Thanks Tentickles.

...More on the concept of -us- as super-organisms, from an old conversation. It refers to a study on the "Human Distal Gut Microbiome." Enjoy...

Originally posted by Silcone Synapse
...On superorganisms,
I found a great little snippet about our symbiotic stomach bacterial friends:

external source " Metagenomic Analysis of the Human Distal Gut Microbiome

Steven R. Gill et al.

The human intestinal microbiota is composed of 10 to the power of 13 to 10 to the power of 14 microorganisms whose collective genome ("microbiome") contains at least 100 times as many genes as our own genome. We analyzed 78 million base pairs of unique DNA sequence and 2062 polymerase chain reaction-amplified 16S ribosomal DNA sequences obtained from the fecal DNAs of two healthy adults. Using metabolic function analyses of identified genes, we compared our human genome with the average content of previously sequenced microbial genomes. Our microbiome has significantly enriched metabolism of glycans, amino acids, and xenobiotics; methanogenesis; and 2-methyl-D-erythritol 4-phosphate pathway-mediated biosynthesis of vitamins and isoprenoids. Thus, humans are superorganisms whose metabolism represents an amalgamation of microbial and human attributes.

This is really important stuff -- our nutrition is very dependent on these microbes, and there is every reason to think that their ecology affects our overall health status as well. And we know very little about them -- heck, these guys are using the same metagenomic techniques to fine organisms in our bodies that are used to find new unidentified ocean life! "

From:

www.johnhawks.net...

Wow,theres a whole universe of species helping us out!
Thats before we even consider that our own genome could be another super organism.

"Symbiotic",I like that word.I wish humans were symbiotic with each other and nature.Oh well.

So cool. I knew about the massive amount of bacteria living on our skin, but it's so cool that they are cataloging the species. It seems only right. Pretty soon we can publish a Field Guide to the Human Body. (Although I bet there already is one out there)

Originally posted by ravenshadow13
Pretty soon we can publish a Field Guide to the Human Body.

PLEASE!

And the kids version, "All about ME, and the Bugs that Make Me."

and s

Take into account the idea of microbes, fungi and bacteria that can actually take over the brain functions of their hosts, such as the parasite that causes ants to walk up to the top of grass blades to be eaten by cows, where the organism reproduces in the cows intestines.

Now consider that you are possibly just a giant robot, piloted by micro-organisms.

I must have an aquatic zoo, full of crabs ....



not really , that would be gross and I'd have to explain them to the wife.

Yay I'm special! I take great pride in my bacteria, I touch my self all over so they get to travel a lot, I'm a big proponent of smelly feet and looking like a tramp for large portions of the day... I was a mucky kid.

It's a great idea that you will never ever be alone I might just delay taking a shower now, If any one is interested I could set up a mail order service and send my boys any where in the world - viva la bacteria!

We are a host for a lot of microbes ,viruses and fungi. Not only on skin, but also inside (like several kilograms we carry in our gut, bon appetite). So i am pretty amazed that we start only now to "map" these guys out.

Now consider that you are possibly just a giant robot, piloted by micro-organisms

Well, not very probable. But i would accept the hypothesis that our brain size and its "abnormal" function is a result of actions of some parasite. Not controlling us, but influencing our development to mutual benifition. To control our CNS one has to have similary high developed capabilities.

Originally posted by ZeroKnowledge
We are a host for a lot of microbes ,viruses and fungi. Not only on skin, but also inside (like several kilograms we carry in our gut, bon appetite).

...i would accept the hypothesis that our brain size and its "abnormal" function is a result of actions of some parasite. Not controlling us, but influencing our development to mutual benifition. To control our CNS one has to have similary high developed capabilities.

Did you know...?

One school of thought calls the gut our body's "second brain" ?

The Second Brain

Dr. Michael Gershon has devoted his career to understanding the human bowel (the stomach, esophagus, small intestine, and colon). His thirty years of research have led to an extraordinary rediscovery: nerve cells in the gut that act as a brain. This "second brain" can control our gut all by itself. Our two brains -- the one in our head and the one in our bowel -- must cooperate. If they do not, then there is chaos in the gut and misery in the head -- everything from "butterflies" to cramps, from diarrhea to constipation. Dr. Gershon's work has led to radical new understandings about a wide range of gastrointestinal problems including gastroenteritis, nervous stomach, and irritable bowel syndrome. The Second Brain represents a quantum leap in medical knowledge and is already benefiting patients whose symptoms were previously dismissed as neurotic or "it's all in your head."

ALSO SEE:

Discovery helps understand how the “second brain” works

Enteric Nervous System - Understanding How The 'Second Brain' Works]URL

The Second Brain : The Scientific Basis of Gut Instinct and a Groundbreaking New Understanding of Nervous Disorders of the Stomach and Intestines (Hardcover) Amazon

Wyoming researcher studies ‘second brain’ in gut tissues

Our Second Brain: The Stomach



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[edit on 31-5-2009 by soficrow]