Top Highlights

• The Greek physician and father of modern medicine, Hippocrates, first said in the third century B.C.E., “All disease begins in the gut.
• In the nineteenth century it was the Russian-born biologist and Nobel laureate Élie Mechnikov who made a stunningly direct link between human longevity and a healthy balance of bacteria in the body, confirming that “death begins in the colon.
• We call this complex internal ecology that thrives within us and its genetic fingerprint the microbiome (micro for “small” or “microscopic,” biome referring to a naturally occurring community of flora occupying a large habitat — in this case, the human body).
• In other words, the state of your microbiome determines whether or not your body is fanning the flames of inflammation or squelching them.
• Foods such as garlic, Jerusalem artichoke, jicama, and even dandelion greens, as well as fermented foods such as sauerkraut, kombucha, and kimchi open the door for heightened levels of health in general,