What are Psychobiotics?

Scientists have recently discovered the connection between our gut and our brain.

As knowledge of the gut-brain link grows, psychobiotics is a name being given to probiotics that have an impact on the brain¹⁰. To fully understand what psychobiotics are, it is important to understand the vital connection that scientists have discovered between your gut and your brain. The bacteria living in our gut (our microbiota) communicate directly with our brain via the nervous system, and may be integrally linked to the workings and the health of our brain. This communication between the brain and the gut is referred to as the gut-brain axis¹⁰.

The term psychobiotics was coined in 2013 by clinical psychiatrist Professor Ted Dinan¹⁰ and neuroscientist Professor John Cryan. It refers to the friendly bacteria that play a role in the gut-brain axis and influence the health and activity of your brain. More recently, the definition has expanded to include prebiotics, which act as food for our good bacteria and encourage their growth¹¹.

It has now been shown that psychobiotics can produce and deliver neuroactive substances which act on the gut-brain axis¹⁰.