This is a theoretical post. Working from high bacteria and low bacteria cited in this earlier post, I went to DataPunk.Net and extracted information about each genus.

I have struck thru items that appear on both sides. We do not know if these items will help or make things worst…. i.e. these are should avoid for safety items.

The Increase or Decrease are what you in theory would reduce high bacteria and enhance low bacteria. In some cases, the same item will decrease the high bacteria and increase the low bacteria; in general, we have limited knowledge from published articles.

Bottom Line

Some of the increased items above appears to be backed by the literature:

• Saccharomyces boulardii: potential adjunctive treatment for children with autism and diarrhea. [2001]
• An open-label pilot study of a formulation containing the anti-inflammatory flavonoid luteolin and its effects on behavior in children with autism spectrum disorders. [2013]
  • ” the combination of the flavonoids luteolin and quercetin seemed to be effective in reducing ASD symptoms, with no major adverse effects.
• Melatonin as a Novel Interventional Candidate for Fragile X Syndrome with Autism Spectrum Disorder in Humans.
  • Disruption of melatonin synthesis is associated with impaired 14-3-3 and miR-451 levels in patients with autism spectrum disorders.
• Brief Report: Metformin for Antipsychotic-Induced Weight Gain in Youth with Autism Spectrum Disorder [2017].
  • “Results indicate that treatment with metformin stabilized BMI z-score over a nearly 2 year mean treatment period. “
• Amelioration of behavioral aberrations and oxidative markers by green tea extract in valproate induced autism in animals [2011].

This is the third time that we observed: microbiome shift seen in an autoimmune condition–> what corrects the shift –> studies confirm the suggestions improves the condition.

As always consult with your medical professional before changing diet or supplements. The above considers the condition is isolation of other conditions that may be a factor.

This is part of a current blog arc looking at related conditions that often seem to be in the family of people with CFS/FM/IBS.  A reader forwarded me a link to A Single Species Of Gut Bacteria Can Reverse Autism-Related Social Behavior In Mice [2016]. The species was Lactobacillus Reuteri — the bacteria ascribed to being the source of B12 in humans.  CFS patients usually have zero of it — hence the need for B12 supplements and injections.

This post is dedicate to a local CFS suffer who has a child with autism.

“We cultured a strain of L. reuteri originally isolated from human breast milk and introduced it into the water of the high-fat-diet offspring. We found that treatment with this single bacterial strain was able to rescue their social behavior,”

Autism and the Microbiome

• The Gut Microbiota and Autism Spectrum Disorders[2017].
  • “Gastrointestinal (GI) symptoms are a common comorbidity in patients with autism spectrum disorder (ASD), but the underlying mechanisms are unknown. Many studies have shown alterations in the composition of the fecal flora and metabolic products of the gut microbiome in patients with”
  • “Accumulating evidence demonstrates that gastrointestinal (GI) symptoms, such as abdominal pain, gaseousness, diarrhea, constipation and flatulence, are a common comorbidity in patients with ASD (Chaidez et al., 2014).”
  • “The gut microbiota of infants who were delivered vaginally resembles their mother’s vaginal microbiota, which is dominated by Lactobacillus, Prevotella, or Sneathia spp., and the gut microbiota of babies who were born by Cesarean section is similar to their mother’s skin microbiota, which is dominated by Staphylococcus, Corynebacterium, and Propionibacterium spp. (Dominguez-Bello et al., 2010).”
  • “Compared with the gut microbiota of children without ASD, the gut microbiota of children with ASD is less diverse and exhibits lower levels of Bifidobacterium and Firmicutes and higher levels of Lactobacillus, Clostridium, Bacteroidetes, Desulfovibrio, Caloramator and Sarcina (Finegold et al., 2002, 2010; Adams et al., 2011; Finegold, 2011; De Angelis et al., 2013).”
  • “Children with autism who present GI symptoms have lower abundances of the genera Prevotella, Coprococcus, and unclassified Veillonellaceae than that found in GI symptom-free neurotypical children (Kang et al., 2013).”
  • “Fecal samples from children with ASD also have higher levels of the Clostridium histolyticum group (Clostridium clusters II and I) compared with samples from unrelated healthy children (Parracho et al., 2005).”
  • “The reduction of Clostridium yields significant improvements in children with ASD (Sandler et al., 2000). “
  • “Additionally, children with ASD present alterations in their levels of Bifidobacterium, Prevotella, and Sutterella (Wang et al., 2013).”
    • “and demonstrated a low relative abundance of Bifidobacterium spp. and the mucolytic bacterium Akkermansia muciniphila in children with ASD [11].
  • “found a significant increase in the Firmicutes/Bacteroidetes ratio in autistic subjects relative to normal subjects. They also found that Candida was two times more abundant in autistic individuals than in normal individuals (Strati et al., 2017).”
  • ” the Autism Diagnostic Interview (ADI) restricted/repetitive behavior subscale score has associated with the amount of Desulfovibrio spp. (Tomova et al., 2015). “
• Distinct Microbiome-Neuroimmune Signatures Correlate With Functional Abdominal Pain in Children With Autism Spectrum Disorder[20176]
  • “A significant increase in several mucosa-associated Clostridiales was observed in ASD-FGID, whereas marked decreases in Dorea and Blautia, as well as Sutterella, were evident. “
• New evidences on the altered gut microbiota in autism spectrum disorders[2017].
  • ” We found a significant increase in the Firmicutes/Bacteroidetes ratio in autistic subjects due to a reduction of the Bacteroidetes relative abundance. At the genus level, we observed a decrease in the relative abundance of Alistipes, Bilophila, Dialister, Parabacteroides, and Veillonella in the ASD cohort, while Collinsella, Corynebacterium, Dorea, and Lactobacillus were significantly increased. Constipation has been then associated with different bacterial patterns in autistic and neurotypical subjects, with constipated autistic individuals characterized by high levels of bacterial taxa belonging to Escherichia/Shigella and Clostridium cluster XVIII. We also observed that the relative abundance of the fungal genus Candida was more than double in the autistic than neurotypical subjects, yet due to a larger dispersion of values, this difference was only partially significant.”
• ” autistic subjects with gastrointestinal disease harbor statistically significantly (p = 0.031) higher counts of C. perfringens in their gut” [2017]

Microbiome Treatment

• “According to a cohort study, oral supplementation with Lactobacillus acidophilus twice daily for 2 months decreases the D-arabinitol levels in the urine of children with ASD and improves their ability to follow directions, as demonstrated through comparison with data collected before the treatment (Kaluzna-Czaplinska and Blaszczyk, 2012). “
• “ase study showed an ASD boy with severe cognitive disability was treated with VSL#3 (a multi-strain mixture of 10 probiotics) for 4 weeks. The treatment relieved the GI symptoms and improved the autistic core symptoms (Grossi et al., 2016). “
• ” The prebiotic galactooligosaccharide (B-GOS) increases the levels of Bifidobacterium spp. in an in vitro gut model, as demonstrated through the analysis of fecal samples from children with ASD and controls (Grimaldi et al., 2017).”
• “treatment with Bacteroides fragilis reduced gut permeability, altered the composition of the gut microbiota and decreased ASD-like behaviors in a rodent model of ASD (Hsiao et al., 2013). “
• ” the proportion of Bacteroidetes/Bacteroidales significantly increased and the proportion of Bifidobacterium significantly decreased [after Vitamin A supplementation]” [2017]

Bottom Line

Autism microbiome is different from the CFS microbiome, there is evidence that it may be seeded as an altered microbiome very early in a child’s life.

Readers have asked about this privately, I thought it would be good to give a fuller answer:

From A Review on Kombucha Tea—Microbiology, Composition, Fermentation, Beneficial Effects, Toxicity, and Tea Fungus [2014]

• “Currently kombucha is alternately praised as “the ultimate health drink” or damned as “unsafe medicinal tea” (Blanc 1996; Hartmann and others 2000). “
• “Similarly to milk-derived kefir, the exact microbial composition of kombucha cannot be given because it varies. “
• “He isolated an Acetobacter sp. (NRRL B-2357) and 2 yeasts (NRRL YB-4810, NRRL YB-4882) from a kombucha sample”
• “The predominant acetic acid bacteria found in the tea fungus are A. xylium, A. pasteurianus, A. aceti, and Gluconobacter oxydans (Liu and others 1996). “
• “In addition to acetic acid bacteria there are many yeast species in kombucha. A broad spectrum of yeasts has been reported including species of Saccharomyces, Saccharomycodes, Schizosaccharomyces, Zygosaccharomyces, Brettanomyces/Dekkera, Candida, Torulospora, Koleckera, Pichia, Mycotorula, and Mycoderma.”

In short, every Kombucha brand is likely to contain different combination of bacteria and yeast. In addition to the above, the following are reported from studies cited above:

1. Saccharomyces cerevisiae
2. Saccharomyces bisporus
3. Saccharomycoides ludwigii
4. Schizosaccharomyces pombe
5. Zygosaccharomyces sp.
6. Zygosaccharomyces rouxii
7. Zygosaccharomyces bailii
8. Brettanomyces intermedius,
9. Brettanomyces bruxellensis,
10. B. claussenii
11. Zygosaccharomyces kombuchaensis
12. Candida famata,
13. Candida guilliermondii
14. Candida obutsa
15. Candida famata.
16. Candida stellata
17. Candida guilliermondi
18. Candida colleculosa
19. Candida kefyr
20. Candida krusei
21. Torulaspora delbrueckii
22. Mycotorula
23. Mycoderma
24. Pichia
25. Pichia membranefaciens
26. Kloeckera apiculata
27. Kluyveromyces africanus

As expected, there have been no clinical studies with CFS/FM/IBS.

“On the basis of these data it was concluded that the largely undetermined benefits do not outweigh the documented risks of kombucha. It can therefore not be recommended for therapeutic use.” [2003]

Bottom Line

Not recommended. This is no evidence of benefit to any autoimmune or related conditions.  Each individual batch from a supplier may contain different bacteria and fungal combinations. “Fermented food” is not miracle food, especially when you may be dealing with overgrowth of one or more of the bacteria that happens to be in the fermented food.

For clarity:

• One batch from one brand may very well help some
• Another batch from a different brand may result in candida issues or worst

If the Kombucha does not list all of the fungi and bacteria (by species at least, strain preferred), you have no idea of what you are actually taking.

A reader forwarded me their results to look at. As usual, I will focus the bacteria. The rest of the report was within normal range.

We do not have a wide analysis of different bacteria genus to work from. This is expected because they do the analysis via culturing (which only works for a few genus).

Baccillus

Data punk reportes it is inhibited by

• Garlic (allicin)
• Oplopanax horridus (Devil’s club)

Enterobacter cloacae

Going over to DataPunk we see that it feeds on:

• L-Lysine
• Acetoin  
• D-Lactose [Excessive is usually seen in CFS)

And is inhibited by

• Laminaria hyperborea (Kelp)
• Chaga (Inonotus obliquus)
• Sarcodiotheca gaudichaudii
• Propyl gallate – E310 food additive
• Methyl gallate – in plants used in Mexican and Indian folk medicines
• Tannic acid  (food containing)
• Laminaria digitata (Kelp)

Bottom Line: What do you do with reasonable bifidobacterium?

We have no Lactobaccillus and no E. Coli in the report.

For E.Coli, the items are simple:

• Symbioflor-2
• Mutaflor
• D-Ribose sugar (see this post for more food for E.Coli)

For Lactobacillus, my current ‘gut’ feeling is:

• Lactobacillus Fermentum
• Lactobacillus Plantarum
• Lactobacillus Casei

A reader sent me a study of persistence of lactobacillus for at least 11 days being seen with a fermented oatmeal soap (an PDF/Scan article from 1993 ) with 1-5% malted barley flour. I suspect the process may be similar to making your own yogurt.

This is a theoretical post. Working from high bacteria and low bacteria cited in this earlier post, I went to DataPunk.Net and extracted information about each genus.

I have struck thru items that appear on both sides. We do not know if these items will help or make things worst…. i.e. these are should avoid for safety items.

The Increase or Decrease are what you in theory would reduce high bacteria and enhance low bacteria. In some cases, the same item will decrease the high bacteria and increase the low bacteria; in general, we have limited knowledge from published articles.

For caution, we should ignore items that impact only one of the bacteria. We want items that impact several bacteria.

Bottom Line

Some of the increased items above appears to be backed by the literature:

• Effect of ω-3 polyunsaturated fatty acids on arthritic pain: A systematic review [2017].
  • “ω-3 PUFAs may have a therapeutic role in decreasing pain associated with RA, with doses of 3 to 6 g/d appearing to have a greater effect”

There were some pleasant surprises above…

• On the right there are a lot of sugar substitutes (Saccharin, Stevia, Sucralose / Splenda)…. and evidence is that they reduce risk of RA! They may also reduce the severity (speculation)
  • “Regular consumption of sugar-sweetened soda, but not diet soda, is associated with increased risk of seropositive RA in women, independent of other dietary and lifestyle factors.” [2014]
• Resistant starch Types I,II,III are all should be reduced while Type IV should be increased.
  • • “Dietary modulation of the gut microbiota impacts human health. Here we investigated the hitherto unknown effects of resistant starch type 4 (RS4) enriched diet on gut microbiota composition and short-chain fatty acid (SCFA) concentrations in parallel with host immunometabolic functions in twenty individuals with signs of metabolic syndrome (MetS). Cholesterols, fasting glucose, glycosylated haemoglobin, and proinflammatory markers in the blood as well as waist circumference and % body fat were lower post intervention in the RS4 group compared with the control group. 16S-rRNA gene sequencing revealed a differential abundance of 71 bacterial operational taxonomic units, including the enrichment of three Bacteroides species and one each of Parabacteroides, Oscillospira, Blautia, Ruminococcus, Eubacterium, and Christensenella species in the RS4 group. Gas chromatography–mass spectrometry revealed higher faecal SCFAs, including butyrate, propionate, valerate, isovalerate, and hexanoate after RS4-intake. “[2016]
      • This was a human study and used 30% RS4 enriched flour.
      • One source.

For magnesium (where for CFS/FM in general, more is better) we have the opposite being suggested above, that is reduce it!!. Looking at studies — a reduced level appear to help RA.

• Short-term low-magnesium diet reduces autoimmune arthritis severity and synovial tissue gene expression[2017].

This is the second time that we observed: microbiome shift seen in an autoimmune condition–> what corrects the shift –> studies confirm the suggestions improves the condition.

As always consult with your medical professional before changing diet or supplements. The above considers the condition is isolation of other conditions that may be a factor.