068: Microbiomes everywhere with Jack Gilbert

Jack Gilbert talks about his studies on microbiomes of all sorts. He describes the origin of the Earth Microbiome Project, which has ambitions to characterize all microbial life on the planet, and talks more specifically about the built microbiome of manmade ecosystems such as hospitals. Gilbert explains how advances in scientific techniques have driven past microbiome-related discoveries and will continue to do so in the future.

Host: Julie Wolf

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Julie's biggest takeaways:

1. Insect-pathogenic fungi living in plant roots can pass nitrogen from killed insects to their plant hosts, receiving different carbon nutrients from the plants in return.

2. Fungi harvested after growth on inexpensive materials like chicken droppings are used in agriculture both as fertilizer and as insecticide.

3. Cyclosporine was first discovered in insect-pathogenic fungi.

4. Raymond St. Leger and other scientists working to introduce genetically modified microbes into the environment deeply consider the societal effects of their work, including collaboration with local communities, governmental regulatory bodies, and trusted leaders and tailor their efforts to the regional area.

Featured Quotes (in order of appearance):

"We really can apply ecological understanding of microbiomes and microbial ecosystems to any environment."

"I think basic research is absolutely essential but I always want to think about what that could lead to in the future."

"Reproducibility is key and extraordinarily difficult in all fields of science due to lack of appropriate funding and a zeitgeist in science that discourages scientists from reproducing one another's studies."

"We are forever striving to validate the predictions we derive from our descriptive work. We create SO MANY predictions!"

"No small dreams, no small goals - go big or go home! At the end of the day, we all want to feel like we're doing something that makes an impact."

"I love to collaborate. I love to work with other people, brilliant people in the microbiome field"

"I'm often accused of not being focused enough. What does Jack Gilbert do? Well, I do a little bit of everything - as long as there's a microbe involved! I like it like that; it keeps me energized."

Links for this episode

• Jack Gilbert website at University of Chicago
• Jack Gilbert TedxNaperville Talk
• Earth Microbiome Project home page
• Dirt is Good - new book by Gilbert and Rob Knight
• History of Microbiology Tidbit: Joshua Lederberg piece in The Scientist on 'microbiome' nomenclature in 2001.

Send your stories about our guests and your comments (email or recorded audio) to jwolf@asmusa.org.