What to Eat to Power Your Brain | Dr. Mahmoud Ghannoum on Health Theory

The idea that going through the birth canal is really building your microbiome is becoming clear because a lot of the time people born with cesarean sections, for example, they don't have the same microbiome as those that are born natural way. Hey everybody, I hope you enjoyed this episode brought to you by our sponsors at Blinkist. Everybody, welcome to Health Theory. Today's guest is Dr. Mahmoud Ghannoum, considered one of the world's leading experts on the microbiome. He's published an astounding 400 scientific papers and has been cited by more than 20,000 different papers and other scientists. His work is so foundational to our understanding of the microbiome that he actually coined the term mycobiome, which is probably the perfect place for us to start. So, Dr. Ghannoum, please walk people through exactly what the mycobiome is and how it's different or a piece of the microbiome. I think that'd be really helpful. Yeah, first of all, I'd like to thank you for having me. It's a great pleasure. So, the mycobiome, you know, the study of fungus it's mycology. That's why we say mycobiome, which means it's the myc- fungal community that lives in our body. We know that we have microbes in our skin, in our gut, in our mouth, all over our body. People used to think it's all bacteria. And really, they used to use the term microbiome to refer to bacteria, but in fact, in addition to the bacterial community, we have fungal community, we have viruses, we have parasites. So, the fungus there, we call it the mycobiome. Yeah, this is something you don't hear a lot of people talk about, but you've got obviously microbes, you've got fungi, you've got phages, which I know virtually nothing about, and you've got viruses, which sound bad. So, it'd be really interesting to to begin to understand what role each of them play, how they're working in harmony, and then obviously we'll get into dysbiosis, where it all goes wrong, and then be great to talk about how we, you know, get ourselves into an ideal state. Yeah. I think you bring really very important point, because people sometimes think that these microbes living in our gut, they live alone. In fact, they are like in a sandbox, where kids come together and they start to play. So, that's exactly what happens between bacteria and fungus. They come, work together to our good or our bad. When they are in harmony, we have good health. While if they become fighting together in a way, then you have a number of health issues and conditions. So, in a way, we need to look at the mycobiome as totality, because all of these organisms, like a garden, they live together there, and they interact, and as I mentioned, when they are in a good uh good friendship, good you can get along with people, you help us, and if not, we are in trouble. Yeah, so 7 ish years ago, let's say, I didn't I didn't even know the word microbiome. I'd never heard of it. I had no sense of what it was, and then my wife went through a very profound um state of dysbiosis. Of course, we didn't know what it was. We didn't know it was dysbiosis. It was really crazy. And through all of this, um it was really hard to wrap my head around what's going on. And I think that uh an analogy perhaps that will help people enter this is once you realize that a forest, like a real forest, is below the ground communicating and sharing resources and withholding resources, treating their own offspring one way, um responding to something maybe a far afield in the forest, um like a a fungal overgrowth or something, by sending sort of toxins that way. When I started hearing about that, it's easy for me to understand it at that macro level where I can imagine the root system, I can imagine the biology of it, if that makes sense. And when I started thinking about, okay, in our gut it's happening at at a microscopic level, but is the analogy of the forest communicating under the soil, is that pretty accurate for what's going on in our gut? I really like that analogy. I tried to sometimes use the garden in our backyard, but it's exactly the same because if you think about it, as you said, we see that bacteria and fungus, they help the roots of a of a plant, which really allows it to to have more nutrients and make it grow and give us all the shade we need. Okay? So So that's the same exactly what happened in our gut. These organisms, they work together. And there are beneficial organisms, such as, let's say, in bacteria, lactobacillus. And there are bad organisms, and for this example, I'm going to give you the candida, which is a fungus. The good thing about lactobacillus, it keeps candida under control. Okay? So that's why what we would like to do in the garden or in the forest, for that matter, is try to encourage the growth of the good microbes and try to inhibit the bad microbes. Otherwise, we'll start to have rust and smut and other plant diseases which you see in the forest. All right. So, I want to keep going with this analogy because one thing I found in my life is once I can imagine the process, the biology of it, I can begin to make far wiser choices because I understand the chain of cause and effect. So, I'd really like to understand better at a simplified level, if you had to assign percentages when we're digesting food, how much of it is the body itself is producing enzymes or whatever, and how much of it is the the garden or the forest of our bacteria, fungi, phages, viruses, like that interplay there working together. So, that if I had to just swing a guess, I would say we're probably an 80/20 or a 90/10 split where your body's doing really very little and then the the garden is doing the rest. Is that pretty accurate? You know, in a way, it depends of what you on what you are defining. If we are talking about, let's say we eat something, okay, such as sugar, for example. Our body try to break it down and this sort of thing. However, the microbes, such as fungus, start to use it and overgrow. But really, when you think about it, what's nice about the bacteria and the fungus in our body is that let's say we take you eat a fiber because I always like to encourage the growth of good bacteria and they love fiber and they break it down. Our body does not break it down. So, it goes through our intestine down to the large intestine and then start breaking it down. And what they do, they produce these metabolites. I'll give you an example, short-chain fatty acids. It's basically fatty acids with short chains, as it says, you know? And those have been shown to play very important role in supporting our immunity, for example. Also, by breaking down this this food and producing some of these metabolites, there are a a large number, as you can imagine, of products are produced, you know? They also can communicate with our brain. Remember, bacteria also can produce vitamins. So, in a way, we have a factory of chemical factory, in fact, where we produce all these compounds. Some of them will affect our immune system. Some of them will help our nutrition, like vitamins. Obviously, this is good and nutrient. Now, if we look at these organisms, when they are in harmony, they really are doing good stuff together, okay? And let me give you an example about this. For when we eat a complex carb, let's say, candida breaks it down. And then, what it gives, it gives a byproduct. And this byproduct it used by bacteria to produce other byproducts, which can It's really complete the circle where candida can use. So, they work together to for their benefit, and also our benefit when they are good guys. Yeah, that that's me really begins to clarify why it's so important to get that harmony right between the different elements of the microbiome, because once you understand that what you're really uptaking into the body is the byproduct of them their balance, right? So, who's in there? So, if one guy is producing something that is not helpful for us and the other species is producing vitamins for instance. It's like, okay, well clearly if I have bad producer over here and he's proliferating and I've got my vitamin producer over here and they don't exist then or they're you know greatly diminished through whatever high stress antibiotic use, you know, whatever bad diet, whatever the case may be then it's like well the metabolites that are being produced by the chemical factory like you were talking about they're producing the wrong thing. And so now I'm getting sick. Now I'm fatigued. Now I have mood disorder. And a lot of what's being produced is what I've heard referred to as a signaling molecule. So it in understanding all of that for me it was like, okay, now I can picture why I need to eat certain things, why I need to avoid certain things because it comes down to what is the the forest or the garden, what is it communicating? So if it's creating not just building blocks, it's also creating communication elements that say do this, do that, turn this on, turn that off. It's like, whoa, this becomes a very complicated um symphony. Exactly. I think you bring out a very important point which is the communication. Before we always thought that our brain tells us what to do. Now with the microbiome, we know there is bidirectional communication. It's two-way street here. Our brain can tell our gut, but our gut also can tell our brain and where they influence each other. Okay? So in a way that's what's happening. It's not only just producing as you say product is the signaling which you mentioned. There are of course some ways where we have cytokines which some of the immune um elements like anti-inflammatory cytokines. They are substances that can either be anti-inflammatory, which means they help our body to fight inflammation, and some of them when for example an organism that produce IL-6 or interleukin-6. This is a bad cytokine because it's associated a lot of the time with inflammation. What I would like to have in my body, I want to feed the good microbes so that they grow and they produce effect on our immune system so that we have more anti-inflammatory cytokines. I don't want to have something like for example some organism that can produce I mentioned remember interleukin-6, which is a bad guy because when this happens it could affect our brain, we'll start to producing more cortisol also, and of course having more cortisol, we're going to have more depression for example. So, it's really I like your view is that it's a complex. It is not a simple way. It's like biology. Biology is always complex, you know. Yeah, so um let's start at at birth. You've gotten into some really interesting stuff around um autism. So, I encountered not too long ago the idea that the the microbiome begins to get populated at birth by going through the vaginal canal and that becomes sort of the the seeding of this garden. One, I'd love to understand what the research is showing about autism and its link to the microbiome. And then also, what is that chain of events? How do we go from when we're a fetus, is there any microbiome or is it literally zero? And then it becomes populated um as you go through the vaginal canal. How does that work? Yeah. I think before we used to be to think it's zero, but now there are studies to show No, even when you are there, there is some microbes. And obviously, it is not a mature microbiome. You know what I mean? As you come out from the birth canal, you get more. And then, as you are fed, for example, breastfeeding and whatever, you add more more variety. And the first few months, you are really building that microbiome. But, then after, let's say, 6 months or something, it becomes more and more stable than when we first start. And the idea that going through the birth canal is really building your microbiome is becoming clear because a lot of the time people born with cesarean sections, for example, they don't have the same microbiome as those that are born natural way. So, it's my understanding that the rate of autism jumps something like 30% uh if you were born via C-section. Is that accurate? You know, you are touching on an area which I just completed a very big study. So, what we did, we wanted to look at uh autistic kids to try to see is there a difference in between their microbiome as well as their siblings compared to their sibling siblings. So, we had about 81 subjects. Mainly, 50 some autistic and the rest their siblings. And we really compared their microbiome both not only bacteria, but also fungus. Because I You know, I'm a fungi. I like to look at fungus. So, we found that there is imbalance between the sibling who are healthy and those with autistic. And we found really very interesting uh data which I recently presented at the International Center for autism research, where we found, for example, the bacteria in autistic kids, they have a reduction in one particular, which is important in breaking down fibers. Okay? And that's why most probably these kids really are very fussy about what eating, and they have difficulty gastrointestinal issues, like 40% up to 40% autistic kids have GI issues or gastrointestinal issues. Okay? We also found other organisms, uh not only with bacteria, but with fungus that are different as well. So, now what we are trying to do is try to understand how we can balance these organisms. Okay? And it's amazing uh both bacteria and fungus play a role in these autistic kids. And one factor, which again I'm now currently doing, is we found a bacteria that is able to produce biofilms. Biofilms is like the plaque in our teeth is a biofilm. We have what we call digestive plaque. But we found this this organism really to be also elevated in these uh autistic kids, you know? That's interesting. I think you're going to have to explain to people why um biofilms are so potentially dangerous. Um because you want to talk about something that scares me, biofilms scare me. So, let me tell I did a study in 2016. I looked at Crohn's disease patients. And we found that they have imbalance in both bacteria and fungus. We found that they have an elevated level of E. coli, Escherichia coli. They have Serratia marcescens, which is also pathogenic bacteria. At the same time, we found that there is an increase of Candida tropicalis. And guess what? We we are lucky because we have in our lab 30,000 different organisms. So, we are able to go get those and put them together. And guess what they did? They formed a big biofilm. So, what is the issue with biofilms in our gut? It's similar to plaque in our teeth. But in in the gut, when they form this biofilm, it's like a Jell-O. Just to make people visualize what it is. It's like a Jell-O. And inside this Jell-O, we have little M&M's or little raisins, for example. So, these raisins and M&M's are the microbes. Whereas, the Jell-O is what they produce. They produce a material called matrix. Okay? And this matrix, as if it is like really you can imagine it is very difficult to get into the raisins because of this matrix. You have to dig in and and take them. So, that's what happens in our gut. They go and on the epithelial cell lining, which you mentioned, they form a thick biofilm. So, you you ask me, "So, what does that mean?" What it means, it covers First of all, when they are living, these bad organisms, E. coli, Serratia, as well as Candida living there, they become protected against antimicrobial agents, against our immune system. They are really bad guys. They working together to start damage our lining, you know, epithelial cell lining. And then, of course, when they do that, they we are going to have gastrointestinal issues, which we, of course, Crohn's disease is a excellent example. But in addition to causing this harm, also by covering the epithelial epithelial lining, we will not have nutrient absorption as well as an efficient way. So, we will start to have, you know, less nutrients and whatever and all the associated factors. So, you can eat but essentially starve to death. Exactly. Exactly. Yeah, that that was what was happening to my wife. I can't say whether it was um due to biofilm or not, but man, it was gnarly. Like, she was eating and she looked malnourished. Her hair started falling out. Her nails were brittle. It was crazy. It was super scary. And this was again, this was back I had to learn about the microbiome specifically because of what she was going through. So, it just felt so impossibly complicated. Now, one thing um cuz she has improved dramatically. Great. But the thing that I will say I keep in my back pocket because she isn't like a teenager who can eat whatever they want. Like, she has to be really careful. Careful. Tells me that she still is in sort of a compromised situation. Her garden too many things have died. There's not enough diversity. Yes. The thing I have in my back pocket is uh FMT. So, the first time I heard about it, I could not believe that fecal microbial transplant was real, that we were quite literally taking the excrement out of one human and putting it into another. Uh that just struck me as so terrifying. Um but it it has shown some real promise. Yes. Where is the state of FMT? How often do you recommend people to try it in um a clinical setting where they're actually helping somebody? Yeah. I think the most really valuable data we got from uh FMT is in uh C. diff. C. diff is C, you know, the infection in the gut. And it was amazing. The first time I was in a meeting, scientific meeting, I was listening to a professor from the of Virginia and he talked about he did 76 patients. He transferred them with fecal transplant from donors who are healthy and lo and behold, they had a huge success, you know? So, to me that was really a good proof that by getting the right microbiome, you are going to get rid of those issues. Also, other studies with respect to the FMT is that you know, a lot of studies in animals where for example, they took some fecal transplant from a slim mouse and gave it to an obese one and they were able the to become the obese become thin again, you know what I mean? So, this is fantastic. Now, you asked me a question, where are we with that? And now the trend is can we get a subset of organisms that we know like like probiotic type of organisms that we know they are going to rebalance our gut and help us. And I would say in the coming few years that would be more the trend than the FMT. Meaning we're going to go in isolate the balanced grouping of microbes, the whole thing, the microbes, the fungi, the phages, the viruses into something that's pure and isolatable and we're going to give them to people, is that Exactly, exactly. And how do we place them in? So, if FMT, I've heard two ways. One encapsulated meaning you actually swallow the tablet and then two basically like an endoscopy where you go in and and sort of I would assume do they start all the way up at the top of the small intestines and Yeah, I yeah. What I think is going to happen is a capsule form. But it's not going to have all the organisms that they are going to that we find in in somebody's who is healthy. What we are going to do is we are going to identify what are the most important organisms that will be able to maintain if number one to rebalance and then maintain our microbiome. So, what's for people that don't understand like the difference between well, that just sounds like a probiotic. So, what's the difference between what you're talking about and a probiotic? Even I'm curious because once it is just the isolated living organisms that sounds to me exactly like a probiotic. So, what what's the difference and why? Cuz the big thing I hear the downside of probiotics is that they don't survive digestion. So, either they don't survive encapsulation, so they're already dead by the time you take it or if it survives encapsulation, it doesn't survive digestion and it gets killed in the stomach and doesn't make it to the actual intestines. So, what are the complications there and and So, there are two topics. There are two topics. One topic is what sort of mix we are going to have. First of all, you are absolutely right. They are like probiotics. The difference the difference is you are going to select certain probiotic strains that will do certain functions with the probiotic don't do. Before probiotic is a wild west situation. Really not a lot of information. Now, the National Institute of Health for example, is putting what we call RFA request for applications from scientist so that they can put proposals to try to see, okay, are these probiotics useful? What subset and this sort of thing. So, I think we are going to see a better refinement. Even though they will be after all we call them probiotic, but they are going to be selected strains that helps that will help us in certain ways. Like for example, I told you in autistic kids, if they don't break fiber, I don't want to take any old probiotic. I want a probiotic that is able to like a strain that I would show that is going to break this fiber. So it's going to be personalized. it mean personalized and more targeted to a given situation. That is very interesting. So now let's talk about what would make of that targeting. So my wife's microbiome is decimated. So what would you give her? Would you give it based on the fact that she's Mediterranean or what? Cuz you've said that people break into basically three camps. Healthy people fall into three types of microbiomes. It isn't It isn't just every person is completely individualized. There is individuality, but for the most part people fall into roughly three camps. Would it be just figuring out which of those three camps she should be in? And how do you decide that? This is a really very good question. Why? Because Okay, how do we know? One way now which was advancement of science and next generation sequencing, we can take a fecal sample and characterize it. We can actually make a profile of a given person. And you are absolutely right. In our studies we showed that there are at least three different profiles, but with and without fungus. Like some the same profile could be with fungus or without fungus. So you have six in total. And so when you for example, with your wife, if we can take a fecal sample, we can analyze that and based on that you will be able to see what sort of dysbiosis, okay, or what sort of imbalance there. And then based on this, you need to start giving recommendation nutritional nutritional recommendations that will improve the growth of this this guy, which we don't have. Like for example, if you have proteobacteria, which is pro-inflammatory or it's a red flag for inflammation, I want to give the person fiber. I want to give them vitamin D3 because this have been shown to reduce that. So you start to make, as you said, personalized approaches to the to rebalance your gut. So I want to go a little deeper on the timeline for the actual personalized sort of probiotic 2.0 or 3.0 where we get the fecal sample, we identify where they're at, we identify and and I'm not sure how, but we identify what of the roughly six groups they're going to they need to fall into, and then we create this cocktail for them that they're going to take. And look, trust me when I say I buy into diet 100%, I buy into lifestyle 100%, um but you've talked about the fact that diet and lifestyle is a change measured in months or even years, whereas the microbiome, the fungi, can be adjusted in 24 hours. And I'm also hopeful that with this cocktail that you're talking about, what what we'll call probiotics 2.0, um is faster, right? But I really want to understand are we are we 10 years away from probiotics 2.0, or we 10 months away? I don't think it's 10 months away, but I don't think it's going to be 10 years. I really believe within the 5-year period, we should be able to get them all. Look, if you think about the and our understanding of the microbiome is just been maybe just over 10 year 10-15 years, okay? So, the first stage we just wanted to understand what is there. Now, we know also they cause issues. Now, we are entering into the future which is the more exciting and will be more really relevant to a situation like your wife where we are trying to understand, "Okay, how can we balance it? What sort of strain do we need?" And I am a you know, I am an optimistic person, okay? And because of this, I think we will reach there within the coming 5 years. I I'm sure. So, going back to the hot button issue of autism, let's talk about is anybody doing human experimentation with autism and FMT and if so, what are the results? You know, this there are a number of companies that are starting to look at autism. And what they are trying to do is trying to see a subset of strains that going to work against against against them. But, they are in clinical trials. They are not completed, but I think again, I expect within the coming 3 years we will see hopefully some some of these strains are going to work. And when you say work, do you think that you can have a partial reduction in symptoms, a total reversal of symptoms? Do you have to catch it by a certain age or does the brain actually develop differently? What do you think that looks like? I think like for me where I am going with autism, I can tell you because I've been thinking, "Okay, how can we do a clinical trial so that at the end of it we learn something which going to help these kids. And I would like to focus on the gastrointestinal issues. What issues they have? They have constipation, they have bloating, they have Can we find a set of organisms that are able going to help them number one, digest the food better, number two, rebalance the gut. Okay? And what I would like to do, I like two things to do. Number one, I really hope we can get a strain that is able to break down fiber. Also, I hope that we have a a sub It's not going to be one. Most probably a handful, not not too many as well, uh which can uh help them with respect to their digestive symptoms. So, it it has to work this way, otherwise it's really not not worth it. Has anybody looked at um so, obviously the microbiome is wildly involved in neurotransmitters. Um has anybody looked at autism and the neurotransmitters? So, if there's a correlation or causation between the inability to break down fiber and neurotransmitters, like I know that um short-chain fatty acids, for instance, if if I'm understanding correctly, certainly lower inflammation, which can have tremendous impact on mood. Um so, have people looked at neurotransmitters in autism and and tried to link that to the microbiome? You know, in autism, it's not as advanced, but I can tell you in Crohn's disease patients, people are looking at it. And in this regard, I was very happy I got a a National Institute of uh Health Grant and I actually got a grant to study oral uh interactions between bacteria and fungus in Crohn's disease. And And what we are doing? Apart from looking at the organisms, we also looking at the metabolomics, which is the metabolites production. And what we are hoping is we are going to go into identify compounds that are, say, elevated in these in these patients compared to their control or healthy people. And then that is going to give you a large number of molecules to look at. And that And some of them may have neurotransmitter effect. Some of them will have inflammatory effect and so and so forth. Like in our study, for example, just to make it put it into perspective, when we looked at organisms that when they come together that are pathogenic, they we found 299 metabolites detected. Wow. Out of these, we found eight that are statistically significant. So now we are going to focus on these eight. Now, do I know what they are what they do? I hope by the end of the 5 years. But that's where, you know, definitely people are looking at the metabolites and I think this is the second wave. That's where I believe Now we are going to move in that direction. So help me understand the um the microbiome in general is at a microbial perspective, anyway, very hard to um adjust. But fungi can be adjusted In your book you say in 24 hours. Yes. One, why is it so much easier to adjust? And then two, what do we hope or what actually comes out of that adjustment? Yeah. I think when I said this, there was a study before where you looked at what you call by Dr. Hoffman, where he looked at short-term diet and long-term diet. And when he compared the bacteria and the fungus, the bacterial community and the fungal community, he found that the fungi is a short-term diet, which means in a short time it can change, okay? Whereas the bacteria, it is more sustainable, it requires long-term diet. And that's really where the first idea came to us. The other thing, why is that? Especially if we eat sugar, for example, fungi and the bad guys love sugar and they grow very fast. In a way, they are, you know, they they are unlike other molds such as aspergillus or penicillium, which they take or even dermatophytes, the organisms that infect our nails and hair, nails, and skin, they take very long time to grow, whereas candida is very fast, it's like bacteria anyway. So, that could account for how very quickly you can populate that or you can starve them as well at the same time. Very interesting. So, as we make the adjustments, we start eating the right diet, we lower our stress, we start working on all that, um what like the microbiome, the the fungus role, what does that control? I think first of all, there are studies that have shown that the microbiome play a role in our immunity, for example. And I remember we gave an example where they or Through metabo- through they influence the ability or to secrete more cytokines. They affect the immune cells to secrete more cytokines. Also, the fungi, if they are overgrow in this biofilm which I mentioned before, you know, it's so interesting because if you look at candida when it is sort of in a way harmless, it's a yeast form. It's like oval, little like we know with baker's yeast, okay? Whereas when it start to grow, it forms what you call the hyphae. It's like threads. It's like little thin threads, okay? And these what they do, they start to break down our gut lining. And once you have this breakdown of the gut lining, you are going to have leaky gut. You are going to have a lot a lot of issues. So, so that's where Candida, if it overgrows, is not a good idea. However, I don't want people to go really so nervous about it. 50% of us have Candida in our gut, you know? I did a study once with my students many years ago, where I wanted to see do they carry Candida in their mouth? So, I said, "Okay, guys, let's do this." This is before I became enlightened about the diet. So, I said, "Listen, I need to take a swab to culture Candida and I'll give you donuts, okay?" And you know, students will will do that. For donuts, they'll do it. So, anyway, what what happened, we found between 50 to 70% of the students has Candida. As long as it is at low level, it's fine. The problem is when it overgrows. In fact, when it is at low at low level, as I mentioned before, it could help help us with fermentation, food food breakdown, and this sort of thing. And the reason that the donut is ironic is that Candida is able to consume that sugar and grow and proliferate. Yes. That's that makes a lot of sense. So, that brings us into what are your diet and lifestyle recommendations? So, for the person that they they have some level of dysbiosis, which I would say in a modern context most people probably do. What what does as close to perfect as possible look like? Now, I think uh I want to buy it. It has it's a whole food, natural food. It has low in sugar, obviously, because as we were been talking about, we need to have uh mono- and polyunsaturated fats. We don't want We want to avoid the saturated fats. You need some good lean proteins, for example, uh from plants, also from chicken, from fish is really uh great. I need to have some food like cruciferous vegetables, for example, for anti-inflammatory, antioxidant. These are really, really good. And also, we need to have fibers, such as a resistant starch is very good. Why? Because I want to support the growth of the good bacteria. Because those good guys is like policemen, they keep the other bad guys under control. So, that's uh that's really from the dietary point of view. All right, so just walk me through you're very specific in your book about what people should eat. Um what would an ideal day look like? What am I having for breakfast? Am I intermittent fasting? Um am I, you know, the eating one meal a day, three meals a day, eight meals a day? Like, what does that look like? Let me Let me tell you what I do. I really uh now uh in the morning, for example, I like oatmeal very much. I love uh a little bit of honey, what not too much because of the sugar, but it's okay. Uh it's better than refined sugar. So, my breakfast usually is uh this way. It's uh uh uh oatmeal, uh berries, raisins. I have some prunes. I I really like like those. And in the weekend, I enjoy uh having uh eggs like omelet, vegetable omelet, and this sort of thing. Now, during the day when I'm at at work, I like to have you know, snacks. I love nuts, especially pistachio. And pistachio, by the way, have been shown to be fantastic with respect to the micro microbiome, better than almond. Even though almonds are good, but pistachios are much better. At lunchtime, I tend to have a salad. And you know, I'm from the Mediterranean myself, like your your your wife. And I love I love salad. And I don't want salad to be too complex. People sometimes add too many ingredients to it. I like to be simple, you know, tomato, a cucumber, spring onions, of course, olive oil, you know, and as well as garlic. Garlic, it is fantastic. And I can tell you, I published some work on garlic. You know, it's a very interesting story. If you don't mind, I'll tell you that. Okay. No, please. I I know the story. It's amazing. You know, so I was working in Kuwait for many many years. I was professor at Kuwait University before I came to the US. And this Kuwaiti faculty, a friend of mine, he every morning he comes to me, "You have to study garlic." I said, "Go away. I don't want to study garlic." Every day he said, "But then, you know, he's my friend." I said, "Okay, I'll study garlic." So, I did. And I published three papers on garlic. You know, and this is what brought me to the US, where they invited me to give a talk on in a conference called First Congress on the Biology of Garlic. And they wanted me to talk about Candida. Of course, I I I was studying against Candida. And garlic is a fantastic thing. I'm biased in more than one way. So, what uh what happened? I was in England with my family, you know, even though we work in I I'm at Kuwait University, I I came to England. My wife is English, so we go to England every summer. And then Saddam Hussein decided to occupy Kuwait. So, overnight I lost my job. And oh my god, we were just 1 week of going back to Kuwait, you know, to to work. And the luckily I already had my visa for the meeting. And they I called them. I said, "Listen, send me the ticket to England." And that's how I came to the US. And of course, I had a kind man help me where gave me, you know, changed my ticket and this sort of thing. And then I ended up getting two jobs in one evening. Again, honestly, I know these days we are all a lot of anxiety and whatever, but this tells you a fantastic thing about the US, how people help and how other human beings help you make a lot of difference in your life. And that's where my story with garlic. Yeah, it's a it's a really beautiful story, man. I I've heard you talk about it a few times and it's super touching that the the guy was a travel agent, if I'm not mistaken. Yes. And you'd asked him for help because you were in DC for the conference, but you now had to stay an extra week, but you had no money. This is, you know, before PayPal and things like that, so there's no way for you to get a hold of any money. So, you go to this travel agent who you've never met ever in your life and say, "Look, I have a friend in Milwaukee, but I have to get back to DC if I'm going to have any hope of getting a job. So, can you give me give me a ticket to Milwaukee and back to DC?" Which he does out of his own pocket. It's unbelievable. Yeah, it's really a beautiful story. And I I know, if I'm not mistaken now, you have a scholarship in his name to to help pay that forward which I think is really exciting. Yes. Yes. We We went and we met with his family. Unfortunately, he passed away February of last year. It's a year ago now and it is really sad. But I tell you when we saw his family, it was fantastic and it made me feel so happy. And now we hope as you say we pay it forward to help somebody else. Because you know like I don't know if I would do it now, but you don't know when you are desperate about something. I just want to help myself. Listen, you are a black guy. You have to help me. He said, "You don't tell me what the hell What the hell is this guy talking about?" I said, "Listen, I need help. I you know." And honest to God, he just did it. It's amazing, you know. But you know, this is the good part of the human nature which we always need to think about and celebrate. You know. I love that. And when you say coming to America, you needed be more opportunity and it didn't matter who you were. Just mattered the results that you were able to to get here in America. And your life is such extraordinary proof of that. You know, one man's kindness is turned into an exceptional business. Just as I said in the intro, the amount of times that you've been cited 400 papers, 20,000 citations, the the contributions that you've made off of that act of kindness is is really pretty extraordinary. I tell you I tell you that kindness not only changed my life. My family's now alive completely, you know. I We came when we were in England, I had a little boy 5 months. My son, my eldest son Hafiz, he was 10 year and my daughter Emma was 7 years. Now they are all grown up. They are all doing well. So you know, it's amazing. Dr. G, man, thank you so much. This has really been amazing. I want to ask you, um if people want to connect with you, if they want to get your book, um where do they go? What's the best place? It's uh First of all, they can go to doctormicrobiome.com, d r microbiome.com. Uh that's we have a site where we are helping people to do some of the stuff. Also, totalgutprogram.com, and also it's in Amazon, Barnes & Noble, and all other places. So, I really, really enjoyed talking to you. This is amazing, man. If you were going to have people make one change that would have the biggest positive impact on their health, what change would you have them make? You know, I really would try like to cut some of processed food. If you can, cut some of the processed food because that's where a lot of the food that can help the pro-inflammatory bacteria grow in our gut. So, just veer a little bit to more natural food. Eat, you know, as I mentioned, I'm from the Mediterranean. Eat some vegetables, eat fruits, and fish, my friend, is fantastic. Amazing. Dr. G, thank you guys so much. Thank you so much. And guys, man, check him out. He's amazing. There's a reason he's been cited as much as he's been cited. Uh just an extraordinary thinker. He's doing amazing research. Definitely somebody to watch. If you haven't already, be sure to subscribe. And until next time, my friends, be legendary. Take care. Hey everyone. 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