Gut microbes help mitigate a major challenge of hibernation Hibernation’s hallmark trait is a profound depression of metabolism that enables animals to survive long periods without eating. This makes hibernation an effective solution to winter’s food scarcity problem; however, it deprives the animal of dietary nitrogen, which is an essential building block for protein. In theory, this should threaten the structure and function of important tissues within the animal, but it has long been known that hibernating mammals avoid this fate and maintain tissue function (e.g., muscle performance) even after many months of fasting hibernation. In this talk, I will discuss our recent work that has revealed how the hibernator’s gut microbes facilitate this tissue preservation and our current work that is investigating how this process may benefit human spaceflight and human health generally.
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