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08, 2019;17 (8): e3000356.

Artificially selecting microbial communities: If we can breed dogs, why not microbiomes?

Flor I Arias-Sánchez, Björn Vessman, Sara Mitri
Author Information
  1. Flor I Arias-Sánchez: Department of Fundamental Microbiology, University of Lausanne, Lausanne, Switzerland. ORCID
  2. Björn Vessman: Department of Fundamental Microbiology, University of Lausanne, Lausanne, Switzerland.
  3. Sara Mitri: Department of Fundamental Microbiology, University of Lausanne, Lausanne, Switzerland. ORCID
PMID: 31469824 DOI: 10.1371/journal.pbio.3000356

Abstract

Natural microbial communities perform many functions that are crucial for human well-being. Yet we have very little control over them, and we do not know how to optimize their functioning. One idea is to breed microbial communities as we breed dogs: by comparing a set of microbiomes and allowing the best-performing ones to generate new communities, and so on. Although this idea seems simple, designing such a selection experiment brings with it many decisions with surprising outcomes. Xie and colleagues developed a computational model that reveals this complexity and shows how different experimental design decisions can impact the success of such an experiment.

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MeSH Term

Animals
Breeding
Dogs
Humans
Microbiota
Journal Article Research Support, Non-U.S. Gov't Comment
Article has an altmetric score of 55

Word Cloud

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