The Mind-Gut Conversation

In this episode of the Mind Gut Conversation podcast, I speak with Dr. Eric Verdin, one of the world’s experts on healthy aging and longevity. Dr. Verdin is president and CEO of the Buck Institute for Research of Aging, the world’s only research institution singularly focused on the biology of aging. During this episode, we talk about a number of fascinating topics, including: 1) Besides lifestyle modifications, what are the most promising strategies to increase the health span in humans? 2) What is the reason for the progressive increase in centenarians in different parts of the world? 3) What role do genes play in longevity? Enjoying our podcast? Please leave us a review and any feedback to improve our show!

In this engaging discussion, Dr. Gerd Gigerenzer, a leading expert in intuition and decision-making, shares his insights from the Max Planck Institute for Human Development. He dives into the differences between rational and intuitive decisions and questions whether women have a natural advantage in intuitive reasoning. The conversation explores how context influences these types of decisions and how AI measures up against human intuition. Gigerenzer emphasizes the importance of simple heuristics and the potential pitfalls of over-relying on complex analytics.

In this episode of the MGC podcast, I speak with Dr. Laurie Keefer, a Health Psychologist and Professor of Medicine and Psychiatry at the Icahn School of Medicine at Mount Sinai in New York City. Dr Keefer’s scientific contributions include the development and implementation of self-management and behavioral intervention tools, known as brain-gut behavior therapies for conditions such as Crohn’s disease, ulcerative colitis, IBS and gastroesophageal reflux disease. Dr. Keefer is Founder and Chair of the Rome Foundation’s international GastroPsych organization and serves on the Board of Directors of the Rome Foundation. She has more than 250 peer-reviewed publications and is a sought-after speaker, mentor and collaborator. Among several other topics, we talk about: 1) The importance of brain gut behavior therapies in inflammatory and functional GI disorders. 2) The long term resistance of the medical community to accept such non pharmacological therapies. 3) How she decides which behavioral approach to chose for individual patients.

In this episode of the Mind Gut Conversation podcast, I talk to Dr. Barney Schlinger, a passionate naturalist, incredible scientist and author of the recently published book, The Wingsnapppers: Lessons from an exuberant tropical bird. Dr. Schlinger is a Professor in the Departments of Integrative Biology and Physiology, in the Department of Ecology, Evolution and Behavior and holds several prestigious positions at UCLA. He has been funded by the National Institutes of Health and the National Science Foundation for over 30 years and is the author of nearly 190 peer reviewed scientific articles in high impact journals. During this episode, we talk about the fascinating story behind the unique courtship of tropical birds, including the unexpected roles of: diet, sex hormones, the digestive system and the brain, that lead to this fascinating behavior.

In this episode of The Mind Gut Conversation, I speak with Dr. Jennifer Fulcher, an Associate Professor in the Department of Medicine, Division of Infectious Diseases at UCLA, and a rising star in the Goodman Luskin Microbiome Center at UCLA. Her research is supported by the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases, National Institute on Drug Abuse, the Doris Duke Foundation, and the California HIV Research Program. Her current research focuses on the effects of HIV and substance use on the gut and oral microbiomes. In our conversation, we addresses some intriguing questions, including: 1) Does the gut microbiome play a role in resilience and resistance to viral infections? 2) Does gut dysbiosis and inflammatory blood markers precede HIV infection? 3) What is the role of the microbiome in susceptibility and severity of COVID-19?

In this episode of The Mind Gut Conversation, I speak with Dr. Rima Kaddurah-Daouk, Professor in the Departments of Medicine and Psychiatry at Duke University Medical School and internationally recognized thought-leader in the pathophysiology of Alzheimer disease. Dr. Kaddurah currently leads and coordinates an international multi-center research consortium, the Alzheimer’s Disease Metabolomics Consortium or ADMC which consists of more than 120 scientists from over 30 academic institutions. She has published over 140 peer reviewed scientific publications, leads a large number of active NIH grants and in 2018, she ranked as the highest funded researcher in departments of psychiatry nationally. Dr. Kaddurah has more than 60 patents or patent applications on use of metabolomics for the diagnosis and treatment of brain diseases. Topics we discuss in this podcast include: 1) What are the major scientific breakthroughs in our understanding of AD that have come from the ongoing research of the NIH AD consortium? 2) The scientific approach on which the AD grant is based on is radically different from the classical reductionistic biomedical research strategy and is based on systems biology and the paradigm of interconnectedness. Based on the lack of progress in effective treatments for AD to date, do you believe this new approach has a better chance of success? 3) Are there any new therapeutic strategies emerging from this new research?

In this episode of the MGC podcast, I talk to Dr. Wayne Jonas, a pioneer and world-renowned in integrative health and healthcare delivery. Dr. Jonas is President of the Healing Works Foundation, whose mission is to make whole person, integrative care regular and routine. He has published two paradigm-challenging books: How Healing Works: Get Well and Stay Well Using Your Hidden Power to Heal; and together with Dr. Alyssa McManamon, his most recent book: Healing and Cancer - a must read for anybody involved in the care of cancer patients. In this episode, we discuss a wide range of topics including: The purpose of Dr. Jonas' latest book, bringing the concepts of healing and whole person care further into oncology and healthcare so that people diagnosed with cancer feel better and live longer. Current cancer care focuses on killing the cancer cell, and in the process supports a major industry to do that more effectively. However, killing cancer cells isn’t the whole story. According to the concept of salutogenesis, when all systems are working well, a person with cancer can actively heal. Like a computer program running in the background, healing of the person is a process occurring all the time.

In this episode of the Mind Gut Conversation podcast, I speak to professor Joel Dore, an internationally known expert on the gut microbiome and Research Director at the French National Research Institute for Agriculture, Food and Environment, INRAE. Joel’s main research interest is the molecular assessment of the human intestinal microbiota in health and disease and investigation of the molecular cross-talk between intestinal bacteria and human cells. He has published more than 220 publications in peer reviewed scientific journals. We discuss a wide range of topics, including the following questions: 1. Utility of currently available stool microbiome tests. 2. Are the unique characteristics of the gut microbiome adaptions to a rapidly changing environment including diet, medications, environmental chemicals like forever chemical, microplastics, other xenobiotics, causing a mismatch with our very slowly changing innate immune system which isn’t able to keep up? 3. Is there solid evidence to say that gut microbial diversity and richness plays a role in resilience to several diseases? 4. What are the major clinical applications of microbiome science?

In this episode of the MGC podcast, I talk to Dr. Robert Lufkin, author of the recent book “LIES I TAUGHT IN MEDICAL SCHOOL. How Conventional Medicine is Making you Sicker and What You Can Do to Save Your Life”.Dr. Lufkin has been an academic radiologist who has taught at both UCLA and USC, and is an author of more than 200 scientific papers and 14 books. In this episode, I ask Dr. Lufkin a range of provocative questions, including: 1. Which of the 10 chronic diseases you deal with in your book is the one where you feel the most misinformation has been transmitted in Medical School? 2. Staying with the subtitle of your book: How Conventional Medicine is Making You Sicker and What You can Do to Save your Life. Even though I agree with you that conventional medicine hasn’t offered any solutions for the root cause of the current chronic epidemic of non-contagious diseases, and that the pharmaceutical industry is making billions of $$ keeping people alive without dealing with the underlying problem, it has been highly successful in increasing the life expectancy in most parts of the industrialized world, with an increasing percentage of the population living into their nineties and above. Let’s discuss. 3. With the important role of the medical pharmaceutical industrial complex, and the food agricultural industrial complex in the current chronic disease epidemic, why blame it all on the role of Conventional Medicine? 4. Bashing conventional medicine has become a popular topic for many internet celebrities, many of them MDs, only to recommend unsubstantiated treatments with no or little evidence with claims for longevity and miraculous solutions for obesity, metabolic syndrome and even Alzheimer’s disease. Would you include this misinformation under your book title as well?

In this episode , I speak to Nathan Price, PhD, co-author with Leroy Hood of The Age of Scientific Wellness. Nathan is Chief Scientific Officer of Thorne and was previously CEO of Onegevity, an AI health intelligence company that merged with Thorne prior to its IPO in 2021. We discuss a wide range of topics and questions, including: There is a seeming contradiction between the dramatic success of the 20th century model of healthcare and the realization that it is ineffective in meeting the challenges of the 21st century. What has happened? In your book, you state that the future of medicine is personalized, predictive, data rich and in your hands. Can you explain? You make a bold prediction in your book: We are on the cusp of time when we will have the capacity to begin to eliminate most chronic diseases of our time, including cancer, neurodegenerative diseases and metabolic diseases. Is this realistic? A growing number of self-declared health care providers take advantage of the situation by promoting quackery and snake oil approaches. What will it take to make an end to this proliferation of fake healthcare? A major challenge of implementing the transition to a new personalized healthcare system is the successful business model of the current system (The Medical Pharmaceutical Industrial Complex), which makes billions of $$ in corporate and individual profits by keeping people alive without preventing or curing their diseases. How can we meet this challenge?