Monitoring the rise and fall of the microbiome

Interesting. It's also possible that one particular individual's microbial makeup is recognized by it's own immune system and when a traumatic event happens (such as those in the article), at least a portion of the new microbial makeup is recognized by the immune system as being foreign and is therefore attacked by the immune system. If that is indeed the case then getting rid of the new microbial makeup and replacing it with the old microbial makeup might be the cure. This would be pretty much impossible, mostly because in most cases, we wouldn't have any idea what the original microbial makeup consisted of and everyone is different. This would mean that if you had led a life of eating burgers, fries, and twinkies that your body's immune system might recognize that as being "normal" and if a traumatic event were to happen to change the microbial makeup, getting rid of the new microbes and going back to eating burgers, fries, and twinkies might be the "cure". Of course the opposite would be true as well.