Spend more time in nature to improve your gut microbiome

Our microbes Our gut can have a big impact on our health, but research shows that what surrounds us—known as our natural environmental microbiome—can also have a big impact. This shows that we all need to spend more time communing with nature, both outdoors and indoors.

I was first introduced to this emerging field of science by Professor Gretchen Daily of Stanford University. He mentioned a Finnish research project that showed that allowing kindergarten-aged children to play in a yard with “dirt” from the forest floor had a significant positive effect on their gut microbiome. Seventy-nine young children participated, all living in an urban environment and spending most of their days in different kindergartens in Finland. The only difference between them was that these kindergartens had three different outdoor areas.

The first type was a fairly standard outdoor play area consisting of concrete, gravel and some plastic sheeting. The second was the type typically found in nursery environments that were already nature-oriented, with grass, dirt, and cultivated areas for children to play. These two served as controls to compare the third experimental location. and gravels are overlain by forest floor and soil segments from native coniferous forest.

During the 28 days of the experiment, the children were encouraged to play in only one of the three types of playgrounds each day (note that some kindergartens have several playgrounds). Before and after the play period, the children’s skin and gut microbiota were measured using genetic sequencing of bacteria from skin swabs and stool samples, as well as changes in T cells and cytokines in their blood. These cells and proteins play an important role in the prevention of autoimmune and autoimmune diseases; their levels are often used as an indicator of how well the immune system is functioning.

Interesting results emerged. Children who played in an experimental playground showed a greater increase in the diversity of their skin and gut microbiota compared to children who played in urban and nature-oriented areas. Importantly, these were the “good” types of microbiota—those associated with health benefits. The children also had a marked increase in immune markers, which indicate that they have enhanced immune regulatory pathways – suggesting a reduced risk of immune-mediated diseases such as inflammatory bowel disease and rheumatoid arthritis.

The importance of this research cannot be overstated. This means that even short-term exposure to nature’s microbial diversity has the potential to radically alter the diversity of the microbiota in our skin and guts. Furthermore, it suggests that altered gut microbiota can modulate the function of our immune system.

A healthy microbiome is made, not born

Everyone has one the different community of microbes in their guts—a person’s ethnicity, food they consume, antibiotic use, body size, and the amount they exercise all leave a clear signature on the diversity of gut microbes. The role of these microbiota communities is significant. Our bodies can only synthesize 11 of the 20 essential amino acids we need, so the rest, along with 13 essential vitamins, are taken up and synthesized by our gut microbes.

And these microbial communities don’t just help our gut extract nutrients from food. Microbes also produce some of the most important compounds for our health, including immunosuppressants, anti-cancer and anti-inflammatory compounds. They appear to be related to the functioning of our immune system, central nervous system, and related health outcomes, so much so that clear correlations have been found between specific gut microbiota—”diseased” microbiomes—and certain diseases. Those with distinct gut microbial signatures include irritable bowel syndrome, inflammatory bowel disease, celiac disease and colorectal cancer, as well as non-gut diseases such as obesity and type 2 diabetes.