Includes bibliographical references (pages 289-300) and index.

Part 1. Our body, the intelligent supercomputer. The mind-body connection is real ; How the mind communicates with the gut ; How your gut talks to your brain ; Microbe-speak: a key component of the gut-brain dialogue -- Part 2. Intuition and gut feelings. Unhealthy memories: the effects of early life experience on the gut-brain dialogue ; A new understanding of emotions ; Understanding intuitive decision making -- Part 3. How to optimize brain-gut health. The role of food: lessons from hunter-gatherers ; The onslaught of the North American diet: what evolution did not foresee ; The simple road toward wellness and optimal health.

"Dr. Emeran Mayer, executive director of the Oppenheimer Center for Neurobiology of Stress and Resilience at UCLA, offers a cutting-edge view into this developing science, showing us the full impact and complexity of how the brain, gut, and microbiome -- the community of microorganisms that lives inside the digestive tract -- communicate with one another... When this communication channel is out of whack, major health problems can crop up in both the mind and the body, including food sensitivities and allergies, digestive disorders, obesity, depression, anxiety, and fatigue."--