Hosts: Jesse Noar

Episode Summary

Five different ways of thinking about our relationship with our microbes!

Microbe of the episode

Microbe of the episode: Tuhoko rubulavirus 3

News discussed

Jesse's takeaways

The microbiome by itself is an amazingly complicated community of many different species, with different lifestyles and metabolisms, all living together in competition and cooperation. On top of that, interactions between the microbiome and our body and our lifestyle multiply the complexity even more.

This article explores five different views of the microbiome and how it fits into our body (or how the body fits in with the microbiome). From the organ view to the ecosystem view, each is a different way of looking at the different functions, dynamic patterns, and integration of the microbiome in its host, and each provides guidance for how to approach treatment of disease and maintenance of health.

Journal Paper

Morar N, Bohannan BJM. 2019. The Conceptual Ecology of the Human Microbiome. The Quarterly Review of Biology 94:149–175.

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