The human microbiota: an historical perspective
نویسنده
چکیده
The discovery by Antony van Leeuwenhoek in 1683 that we have a microbiota was very surprising and undoubtedly of great interest to 17th‐century scientists. However, as modern‐day researchers know only too well, this alone is not suffi cient to ensure continued investigation of a subject. Further research into the microbes that inhabit humans proceeded at a very slow pace until it was realized that these microbes were able to cause disease and, much later, that they contrib ute to human health (i.e., in modern‐day research parlance the research would be recognized as having “impact”). Our knowledge of those microbes with which we coexist has increased enormously during the last few years. An indication of the effort that has been devoted to determining the nature and function of the micro bial communities inhabiting the various body sites of humans can be gleaned from the number of publications in this field listed in PubMed: in 2013 more than 2500 papers were published, nearly four times as many as in 2000. What accounts for this recent huge growth of interest in the human micro biota? There appear to be two main driving forces: (a) increasing awareness of its importance in human disease, development, nutrition, behavior and wellbeing; (b) the development of technologies that enable us not only to identify which microbes are present but also to determine what these microbes are up to. In this chapter these two driving forces are described from a historical perspective.
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