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Recent work has shown that antibiotics can induce sustained changes in the gut microbiome and that such alterations increase the risks for colonization with antibiotic-resistant pathogens (NEJM JW Infect Dis Jun 25 2013) and for Clostridium difficile disease. The ability to reliably restore a normal gut microbiome after antibiotic treatment would clearly be of great benefit.
Now, researchers (with partial support from the food industry) have examined whether dietary modifications can quickly alter the predominant human gut microbiota in a diet-specific manner. They gave 10 volunteers “plant-based” and “animal-based” diets for 5 days each, assessing each individual's gut microbiota daily using 16S ribosomal RNA sequencing on samples collected…