When we sleep poorly, we immediately realize how much it affects our mood. But research suggests that poor sleep is also linked to biological changes in our gut health.

The systematic review recently published thoroughly analyzed all trials and studies associating certain bacterial profiles with poor sleep. In essence, poor sleep is associated with an inflammatory bacterial profile. Given the interest in naturally-occurring muscle mass loss due to ageing – termed sarcopenia -, mechanism through which these inflammatory gut bacteria could in fact favor muscle loss in older adults are proposed. Validating this mechanism in future studies could contribute to a more holistic strategy in preventing and managing sarcopenia.

This project was a joined effort of Jordi Morwani, PhD student under supervision of Eline Slagboom and Marian Beekman in collaboration with Panagiotis Giannos from Imperial College London, Konstantinos Prokopidis from Liverpool University and Clara Belzer from Wageningen University.

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