The trillions of microbes that live in our gastrointestinal tract are known as the gut microbiome. It is an "acquired organ" of the body that is essential for the development of immune and metabolic systems and for nutrient digestion and absorption, among other things. As... click to read more

Clostridium difficile is a bacterium that causes hundreds of thousands of antibiotic-associated diarrhoea cases every year, and these infections often prove fatal. Usually, C. difficile is unable to cause disease as the bacterium is kept in check by the friendly bacteria in the gut; the... click to read more

Each of us carries intestinal gardens, where microbes process food for our own consumption. We evolved to benefit from this, but as our guests are selfish single-cell creatures, tense diplomacy was always needed. Since these bacterial communities in our gut play surprisingly large roles in... click to read more

It is well established knowledge that bacteria routinely exchange genes between unrelated species, creating an extensive network of information flow independent of sexual reproduction. By acquiring new genes, each being a blueprint for a single protein, the bacteria gain also the functions the proteins perform... click to read more