New Frontiers in Medicine

The Human Microbiota: The Rise of an "Empire"

Gidon Berger, Roni Bitterman, and Zaher S. Azzam

Abstract

The human body hosts rich and diverse microbial communities. Our microbiota affects the normal human physiology, and compositional changes might alter host homeostasis and, therefore, disease risk. The microbial community structure may sometimes occupy discrete configurations and under certain circumstances vary continuously. The ability to characterize accurately the ecology of human-associated microbial communities became possible by advances in deep sequencing and bioinformatics analyses.

Rambam Maimonides Med J 2015;6(2):e0018