Gut Feelings: The Microbiome and Our Health

Discover why the gut microbiome holds the keys to human health-and can change the way we understand, treat, and prevent disease. “A detailed and scientifically rigorous survey . . . gives readers a clearer sense of the current state of medical knowledge.” -The New York Review of BooksWe are at the dawn of a new scientific revolution.Our understanding of how to treat and prevent diseases has been transformed by knowledge of the microbiome-the rich ecosystem of microorganisms in and on every human.In Gut Feelings, Alessio Fasano and Susie Flaherty show why we must go beyond the older, myopic view of microorganisms as our enemies to a broader understanding of the microbiome as a parallel civilization that we need to understand, respect, and engage with for the benefit of our own health. Recent advances in understanding the microbiome and its role in human health dovetail with the development of personalized or “precision” medicine to create treatments and prevention programs targeted to t