科学美国人60秒 SSS 肠道细菌：我们饱啦（在线收听）

This Thanksgiving, as you savor your turkey and stuffing, here's something else to give thanks for: the army of microbes that help you digest the feast. Because when you eat, you're feeding them too—and triggering an enormous bloom of gut bacteria. In fact, as many as a billion new E. coli bacteria may come into being during one of those feeding frenzies. But twenty minutes after that population explosion begins, the bacteria reach critical mass, and put on the brakes. And when they enter that 'resting state,' they start pumping out a particular suite of proteins.

感恩节，你在享受火鸡以及其内的填充料时，还有其他一些别的事情需要感激：帮助你消化美食的微生物群。因为，你在吃食物的同时，也在喂它们呢——这会引起肠道内的细菌大量繁殖。实际上，在细菌们疯狂抢食物时，有多达十亿的大肠杆菌形成。但是，在细菌数量激增20分钟之后，细菌的数量达到临界值，不再增加。当细菌进入“休眠”状态时，就会大量排出一种特别的蛋白质。

Researchers harvested those postprandial proteins from E. coli and added them to the colons of rats. And the proteins appeared to interact with endocrine cells in the gut, flipping on the production of hormones that tell the brain "Hey, stop eating. We're full."

研究人员收集了这些大肠杆菌餐后的蛋白质，并将这些蛋白质加入老鼠的结肠内。蛋白质似乎与肠道内的内分泌细胞反应，轻拍到了细胞产生的内分泌激素上面，这些激素复则告诉大脑说嘿，别吃了兄弟，我们都饱了呢。

Meanwhile, mice injected with the E. coli proteins over the course of a week ate less at each meal (though they compensated by eating more often.) All of which suggests that the proteins put out by bacteria can influence—and even interfere with—our sense of feeling stuffed. The study is in the journal Cell Metabolism.

同时，注射过大肠杆菌的老鼠，在过去的一周内，每餐吃的量减少(尽管它们吃东西的次数增多了)。所有这些表明，细菌分泌的蛋白质可以影响——甚至干扰了——我们的饱腹感。该研究结果发表在《细胞代谢》杂志上。

As far as overeating goes—the researchers say we probably won't inject people with bacterial appetite suppressants anytime soon. But it might be worth paying closer attention to the health and composition of our gut bacteria, since they do appear to play a role in regulating our urge to eat. So as you’re stuffing yourself with stuffing on Thursday, you might ask yourself: what would my gut bacteria want?

暴饮暴食现象仍然存在——研究人员称我们可能还不能尽快把这些细菌性食欲抑制剂应用到人类身上。但是这个结果也许会使我们更多的关注健康问题以及肠道细菌复合物，因为它们还真对我们的食欲有些影响。所以当你在感恩节大块朵颐的时候，你也许要问下自己：我们的肠道细菌想吃啥了哇?