Your small intestine (gut) is home to trillions of bacteria from hundreds of different species. They compete, cooperate, grow, shrink, and engage in an intricate dance that keeps a healthy balance. Your gut bacteria influence your whole body. There’s a direct pathway between your gut and your brain, for example [1]. Gut bacteria can even influence body-wide fat storage [2]. Your gut biome’s widespread influence gives you a powerful opportunity to strengthen your whole body. The flip side of that, though, is that when your gut bacteria fall out of balance, you can see a broad range of effects. If...

Right now, as you read this, an entire ecosystem of bacteria is living in your gut. In fact, you might be more bacterium than human: we have about an equal number of bacteria and human cells, possibly skewed slightly in favor of the little visitors [1]. That sounds strange at first - maybe even alarming - but it’s actually a good thing. Researchers are fascinated by gut bacteria; since 2010 there have been more than 8500 studies on the genus Lactobacillus alone [2]. With all that research, it’s becoming clear that your unique collection of gut bacteria has a huge...

“The mitochondria is the powerhouse of the cell.” You probably heard your high school biology teacher say that phrase about a dozen times. It probably showed up on the midterm, too. Possibly in a fill-in-the-blank format. There’s a reason biology teachers hammer the phrase home. Mitochondria are important - they provide all the energy you use to live your daily life. Your mitochondria play a central role in the aging process, brain function, cellular energy production, immune system function, skeletal muscle strength, and more.  You want your mitochondria to be strong; mitochondrial dysfunction is linked to cardiovascular disease, increased cell death and cellular aging, Alzheimer's disease and other neurodegenerative diseases, hallmarks of aging like shortened telomeres, DNA damage, and more. Compromised mitochondria also...

There's a lot out there about detox diets and how to detox. While detoxing does exist, a juice cleanse may not help you too much. Read on to learn about how detoxes really work.