Author: Erin Elizabeth

In November 2016, the ABC Action News I-Team did an investigation into the cleanliness of seven Publix grocery stores, who had all failed their health inspections, in the Tampa area. However, the day after the story aired the Department of Agriculture removed all pass/fail grades and pulled all inspections off-line. (I’m no fan of Publix, you can read about why here.) Why? Because Adam Putnam, Florida’s Department of Agriculture Commissioner, felt the pass/fail system wasn’t clear enough, “…if it’s a failure, why is it still open?” he questioned. (However, the previous violations were serious and now the public has no idea...

GABA, or Gamma-aminobutyric acid, is a neurotransmitter that sends chemical messages through the brain and the nervous system and is involved in regulating communication between brain cells; its role is to inhibit or reduce the activity of the neurons or nerve cells. And it turns out that a recently discovered type of gut bacteria, KLE1738, love it. Well, they love to “eat” it. In 2016, Philip Strandwitz and his colleagues at Northeastern University in Boston found that they could only grow KLE1738 if they gave it GABA- nothing else made it grow. But why is this important? From the article:...