Our guts are home to a cast of billions: bacteria, viruses, and fungi all congregate and collectively make up our microbiome. This vast gastrointestinal tribe shapes the onset, incidence, and treatment of a startling number of diseases including inflammatory bowel disease and cancer. In the past 20 years since the field took off, much has been discovered about how this unseen ecosystem interacts with all aspects of human life, and the rate of discoveries shows no signs of slowing.
As a recent STAT News article noted, it’s academic centers like the PennCHOP Microbiome Program that “play an outsize role in pushing microbiome therapeutics forward.”
“The field is expanding in many directions,” said Rick Bushman, chair of Microbiology. “Understanding the microbiome is helping to sort out the intricacies of diet, chronobiology, cancer treatment, and more. One area with exciting new work centers on how the microbiome develops in infants and how it affects their birth and health in the first few days outside the womb.”
A related study, published last month by Michal Elovitz, a professor of obstetrics and gynecology, found that seven types of bacteria and certain immune factors in a woman’s vagina and cervix may be responsible for increasing the risk of spontaneous preterm birth or protect against it. In the future, Elovitz hopes this knowledge will provide ways to target bad bacteria or increase protective bacteria to keep babies from being born too early.
Read more at Penn Medicine News.
