The microbiome and its publics: A participatory approach for engaging publics with the microbiome and its implications for health and hygiene.

Abstract

EMBO Reports (2018) e45786 The past 20 years have seen a significant drop in the cost of DNA sequencing, which along with high‐throughput (or next‐generation) sequencing has helped to analyse the microbial diversity from environmental samples. Most of this research has focused on microbiomes of the human body and, although there is still much uncertainty about what constitutes a “normal” or “healthy” human microbiome, microbial “dysbiosis” has already been implicated in a range of non‐communicable diseases. > The growing affordability of DNA sequencing has facilitated a range of citizen science, crowd‐funded and DIY microbiome projects… This research is also challenging the common understandings of pathogens and the beneficial role of bacteria for human health [1], and increases awareness of how hygiene and antibiotics impact early‐life microbial colonisation and exposure, and their effects on human health and development [2]. There is both public health and commercial interest in translating this research that might lead to probiotic applications to improve human and animal health, domestic hygiene, waste management and agricultural productivity, amongst other potential benefits. As with the human genome, interest in the microbiome and its effect on health has begun to move beyond the laboratory. The growing affordability of DNA sequencing has facilitated a range of citizen science, crowd‐funded and DIY microbiome projects (http://robdunnlab.com/projects/wild-life-of-our-homes/; http://americangut.org/; www.ubiome.com; https://mapmygut.com/). Various publics have become involved by providing samples, through personalised sequencing and by designing their own experiments in personal microbiome management. Such health‐focused projects often reflect a growing anxiety about the “hygiene” or “microbiome depletion” hypotheses [3]: that the increase in the prevalence of autoimmune and inflammatory disease might be linked to dysbiosis caused by “missing microbes” [2], whose absence is caused by modern hygiene, diet and other lifestyle practices. Affordable sequencing offers new challenges …