Glimcher Study

I know this study is about 6 months old but it has always made the most sense to me. I emailed Laurie Glimcher a while ago and she emailed me back and I attached that email below. She seems to confirm that uc has a bacterial cause that has not been identified yet. Any thoughts??



http://focus.hms.harvard.edu/2007/101207/immunology.shtml




Dear Mr Sanders,
You are most kind to write. It means a great deal to the laboratory that our research efforts are appreciated by patients with the diseases we study. We can't at this point extrapolate from mice to humans- but many patients with IBD have some response, although not usually durable, to antibiotics such as Flagyl. We need to know a lot more about the species of bacteria that are infecting our mice with UC and we are working hard on that question. TNF blockade works well in a subset of patients with UC- you might ask your physician about this.
We. too are excited about the potential benefits that augmenting T-bet activity might bring and are trying to identify compounds that will do just that.
Sincerely
Laurie Glimcher
Dr. Laurie H. Glimcher
Irene Heinz Given Professor of Immunology, Harvard School of Public Health
Professor of Medicine, Harvard Medical School
Harvard School of Public Health
Dept. of Immunology and Infectious Diseases, FXB Bldg Rm 205
651 Huntington Ave, Boston, MA 02115
Tel 617-432-0622
Fax 617-432-0084
Email [email protected]

Interesting.  Sounds well thought out and a viable theory.  Makes me think of the gut permeability, allowing microbes to penetrate the gut, but of course our immune system immediately responds.  Furthermore, under such harsh conditions, even the relatively benign bacteria might become hostile to survive.  Also, we know that some types of bacteria are good in small enough numbers (e.g. anti-cancerous), but can be harmful in larger numbers (like a mob).  What I am not so sure about is their trying to ID one microbe, if I read correctly.  I think multiple types may be responsible and even vary from person to person, which is why at least some UC sufferers benefit from broad spectrum antibiotics.  So that is why finding the right probiotic appears to be at least one step in a benefical direction, since they can crowd out some of these harmful ones and even communicate with our immune system to bring about more order and proper function.  Thanks for the post.