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A framework for microbiome science in public health

Nature Medicine volume 27, pages 766–774 (2021)Cite this article

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Abstract

Human microbiome science has advanced rapidly and reached a scale at which basic biology, clinical translation and population health are increasingly integrated. It is thus now possible for public health researchers, practitioners and policymakers to take specific action leveraging current and future microbiome-based opportunities and best practices. Here we provide an outline of considerations for research, education, interpretation and scientific communication concerning the human microbiome and public health. This includes guidelines for population-scale microbiome study design; necessary physical platforms and analysis methods; integration into public health areas such as epidemiology, nutrition, chronic disease, and global and environmental health; entrepreneurship and technology transfer; and educational curricula. Particularly in the near future, there are both opportunities for the incorporation of microbiome-based technologies into public health practice, and a growing need for policymaking and regulation around related areas such as prebiotic and probiotic supplements, novel live-cell therapies and fecal microbiota transplants.

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Fig. 1: Opportunities for microbiome science in public health.
Fig. 2: Study design considerations for microbiome epidemiology.
Fig. 3: Curriculum suggestions for microbiome sciences in public health.

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Acknowledgements

We thank the Harvard Chan School administration for their support of the Microbiome in Public Health Center. This work was supported in part by NIH NIDDK R24DK110499 (W.S.G. and C.H.) and by the Cancer Research UK Grand Challenge Initiative C10674/A27140 (W.S.G.).

Author information

Author notes

  1. These authors contributed equally: Jeremy E. Wilkinson, Eric A. Franzosa.

  2. These authors jointly supervised this work: Wendy S. Garrett, Curtis Huttenhower.

Authors and Affiliations

  1. Harvard Chan Microbiome in Public Health Center, Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health, Boston, MA, USA

    Jeremy E. Wilkinson, Eric A. Franzosa, Christine Everett, Chengchen Li, Sena Bae, Isa Berzansky, Amrisha Bhosle, Kjetil Bjørnevik, Caitlin A. Brennan, Y. Grace Cao, Eunyoung Chun, Slater L. Clay, Kathrin Fenn, A. Brantley Hall, Dylan Lennon, Lior Lobel, Siyuan Ma, Wenjie Ma, Sagun Maharjan, Lauren J. McIver, Samantha Molsberry, Geicho Nakatsu, Long H. Nguyen, Diogo Fonseca-Pereira, Madikay Senghore, Dmitry Shungin, Rebecca Stern, Kelsey N. Thompson, Tommi Vatanen, Aaron M. Walsh, Dong D. Wang, Kai Wang, Ya Wang, Yan Yan, Yancong Zhang, Alberto Ascherio, Rachel N. Carmody, Jorge E. Chavarro, Marios Giannakis, Smita Gopinath, Christopher D. Golden, Yonatan Grad, William P. Hanage, Albert Hofman, Kyu Ha Lee, Marc Lipsitch, Kimmie Ng, Shuji Ogino, Natalia Palacios, Qi Sun, Matthew K. Waldor, Frank B. Hu, Dyann F. Wirth, Mingyang Song, Andrew T. Chan, Eric Rimm, Wendy S. Garrett & Curtis Huttenhower

  2. Department of Biostatistics, Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health, Boston, MA, USA

    Jeremy E. Wilkinson, Eric A. Franzosa, Chengchen Li, Amrisha Bhosle, A. Brantley Hall, Siyuan Ma, Sagun Maharjan, Lauren J. McIver, Long H. Nguyen, Dmitry Shungin, Kelsey N. Thompson, Tommi Vatanen, Aaron M. Walsh, Dong D. Wang, Ya Wang, Yan Yan, Yancong Zhang, Kyu Ha Lee & Curtis Huttenhower

  3. Infectious Disease and Microbiome Program, Broad Institute, Cambridge, MA, USA

    Eric A. Franzosa, Amrisha Bhosle, A. Brantley Hall, Siyuan Ma, Sagun Maharjan, Lauren J. McIver, Dmitry Shungin, Kelsey N. Thompson, Tommi Vatanen, Aaron M. Walsh, Ya Wang, Yan Yan, Yancong Zhang, Marios Giannakis, Shuji Ogino, Dyann F. Wirth, Andrew T. Chan & Curtis Huttenhower

  4. Channing Division of Network Medicine, Department of Medicine, Brigham and Women’s Hospital and Harvard Medical School, Boston, MA, USA

    Christine Everett, Isa Berzansky, Alberto Ascherio, Jorge E. Chavarro, Natalia Palacios, Qi Sun, Frank B. Hu, Andrew T. Chan & Eric Rimm

  5. Department of Nutrition, Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health, Boston, MA, USA

    Kjetil Bjørnevik, Dylan Lennon, Samantha Molsberry, Rebecca Stern, Alberto Ascherio, Jorge E. Chavarro, Kyu Ha Lee, Natalia Palacios, Qi Sun, Frank B. Hu, Mingyang Song & Eric Rimm

  6. Department of Epidemiology, Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health, Boston, MA, USA

    Madikay Senghore, Kai Wang, Jorge E. Chavarro, William P. Hanage, Albert Hofman, Kyu Ha Lee, Marc Lipsitch, Shuji Ogino, Qi Sun, Frank B. Hu, Mingyang Song & Eric Rimm

  7. Department of Immunology and Infectious Diseases, Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health, Boston, MA, USA

    Sena Bae, Caitlin A. Brennan, Y. Grace Cao, Eunyoung Chun, Slater L. Clay, Kathrin Fenn, Lior Lobel, Geicho Nakatsu, Diogo Fonseca-Pereira, Smita Gopinath, Yonatan Grad, Marc Lipsitch, Dyann F. Wirth, Andrew T. Chan, Wendy S. Garrett & Curtis Huttenhower

  8. Division of Gastroenterology, Massachusetts General Hospital and Harvard Medical School, Boston, MA, USA

    Wenjie Ma, Long H. Nguyen, Mingyang Song & Andrew T. Chan

  9. Clinical and Translational Epidemiology Unit, Mongan Institute, Massachusetts General Hospital and Harvard Medical School, Boston, MA, USA

    Long H. Nguyen, Mingyang Song & Andrew T. Chan

  10. Department of Medical Oncology, Dana-Farber Cancer Institute and Harvard Medical School, Boston, MA, USA

    Marios Giannakis, Kimmie Ng, Shuji Ogino & Wendy S. Garrett

  11. Department of Molecular Metabolism, Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health, Boston, MA, USA

    Wendy S. Garrett

  12. Department of Human Evolutionary Biology, Harvard University, Cambridge, MA, USA

    Rachel N. Carmody

  13. Department of Medicine, Brigham and Women’s Hospital and Harvard Medical School, Boston, MA, USA

    Marios Giannakis

  14. Department of Environmental Health, Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health, Boston, MA, USA

    Christopher D. Golden

  15. Madagascar Health and Environmental Research (MAHERY), Maroantsetra, Madagascar

    Christopher D. Golden

  16. Division of Infectious Diseases, Department of Medicine, Brigham and Women’s Hospital, Harvard Medical School, Boston, MA, USA

    Yonatan Grad & Matthew K. Waldor

  17. Center for Communicable Disease Dynamics, Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health, Boston, MA, USA

    Yonatan Grad, William P. Hanage & Marc Lipsitch

  18. Program in Molecular Pathological Epidemiology, Department of Pathology, Brigham and Women’s Hospital and Harvard Medical School, Boston, MA, USA

    Shuji Ogino

  19. University of Massachusetts, Lowell, MA, USA

    Natalia Palacios

  20. Department of Microbiology, Harvard Medical School, Boston, MA, USA

    Matthew K. Waldor

  21. Howard Hughes Medical Institute, Bethesda, MD, USA

    Matthew K. Waldor

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  1. Jeremy E. Wilkinson
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  2. Eric A. Franzosa
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  4. Chengchen Li
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  7. Mingyang Song
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  8. Andrew T. Chan
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  9. Eric Rimm
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Consortia

HCMPH researchers and trainees

  • Sena Bae
  • , Isa Berzansky
  • , Amrisha Bhosle
  • , Kjetil Bjørnevik
  • , Caitlin A. Brennan
  • , Y. Grace Cao
  • , Eunyoung Chun
  • , Slater L. Clay
  • , Kathrin Fenn
  • , A. Brantley Hall
  • , Dylan Lennon
  • , Lior Lobel
  • , Siyuan Ma
  • , Wenjie Ma
  • , Sagun Maharjan
  • , Lauren J. McIver
  • , Samantha Molsberry
  • , Geicho Nakatsu
  • , Long H. Nguyen
  • , Diogo Fonseca-Pereira
  • , Madikay Senghore
  • , Dmitry Shungin
  • , Rebecca Stern
  • , Kelsey N. Thompson
  • , Tommi Vatanen
  • , Aaron M. Walsh
  • , Dong D. Wang
  • , Kai Wang
  • , Ya Wang
  • , Yan Yan
  •  & Yancong Zhang

HCMPH investigators

  • Alberto Ascherio
  • , Rachel N. Carmody
  • , Jorge E. Chavarro
  • , Marios Giannakis
  • , Smita Gopinath
  • , Christopher D. Golden
  • , Yonatan Grad
  • , William P. Hanage
  • , Albert Hofman
  • , Kyu Ha Lee
  • , Marc Lipsitch
  • , Kimmie Ng
  • , Shuji Ogino
  • , Natalia Palacios
  • , Qi Sun
  •  & Matthew K. Waldor

Corresponding authors

Correspondence to Wendy S. Garrett or Curtis Huttenhower.

Ethics declarations

Competing interests

C.H. is a scientific advisor for Seres Therapeutics, Empress Therapeutics and ZOE Nutrition. W.S.G. is a scientific advisor for Senda Therapeutics, Leap Therapeutics, Evelo Biosciences, Tenza Inc. and SanaRx.

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Peer review information Hannah Stower was the primary editor on this article and managed its editorial process and peer review in collaboration with the rest of the editorial team.

Publisher’s note Springer Nature remains neutral with regard to jurisdictional claims in published maps and institutional affiliations.

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Wilkinson, J.E., Franzosa, E.A., Everett, C. et al. A framework for microbiome science in public health. Nat Med 27, 766–774 (2021). https://doi.org/10.1038/s41591-021-01258-0

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