Your gut bacteria could say a lot about you, such as why you’re diabetic or how you respond to certain drugs.
Your gut bacteria could say a lot about you, such as why you’re diabetic or how you respond to certain drugs.
But scientists can see only so much of the gastrointestinal tract to study the role of gut bacteria in your health. What comes out of you is just a small sample of these bacteria, without indicating where they came from in the digestive system.
Purdue University researchers built a way to swallow a tool that acts like a colonoscopy, except that instead of looking at the colon with a camera, the technology takes samples of bacteria.
The technology could also move throughout the whole GI tract, not just the colon. This tract, in addition to the colon, includes the mouth, esophagus, stomach, pancreas, liver, gallbladder, small intestine and rectum.
Read more at Purdue University
Image: Once swallowed, this capsule is designed to collect bacteria throughout the gut. A scientist unscrews the cap to retrieve the sample after the capsule has left the digestive system. (Credit: Purdue University photo/Mark Simons)
