We Were Never Individuals
Biologists have long appreciated that animals are exposed to an ever-changing microbiota composed of prokaryotes, viruses, and meiofauna. The study of immunology consisted of the responses to these microbiota and their pathogenic nature. However, the study of immunology is changing. Immunology is not just the arms race of pathogen and response to pathogen. Immunology has grown to include that multicellular organisms exist in interdependence with their complex associated microbes. Only recently have immunologists began to realize this interdependence, and determine that pathogens and pathogenesis is the exception and not the rule.
The rule now is symbiotic cooperation with microbiota.
The study of immunology, however, has been slow to evolve to this new rule. Researchers studying host-microbe interactions have been quick to adapt the recent onset of next generation sequencing technologies to determine the microbes associating with the host, and separately, the host response to specific microbes. But few have combined these technologies to look at the diversity of the microbes as well as the variety of the host response to the microbiotic community.
This interface between the host, prokaryotes, viruses, and meiofauna is the holobiont, the functional interaction between these participants to make a biological system.
It is apparent that a simple model system, where all players of the holobiont can be identified, isolated, and re-introduced is needed to understand the rule of interdependence and the exception of pathogenesis. To this end, I have developed Hydra as a simple laboratory model system to explore the holobiont, with a particular focus on Hydra-virus interactions.
The thrust of my research is to identify how such a simple animal selects for its viral partners, uses viruses as a defense parameter, and bases this selection using a very well conserved innate immune system.
The rule now is symbiotic cooperation with microbiota.
The study of immunology, however, has been slow to evolve to this new rule. Researchers studying host-microbe interactions have been quick to adapt the recent onset of next generation sequencing technologies to determine the microbes associating with the host, and separately, the host response to specific microbes. But few have combined these technologies to look at the diversity of the microbes as well as the variety of the host response to the microbiotic community.
This interface between the host, prokaryotes, viruses, and meiofauna is the holobiont, the functional interaction between these participants to make a biological system.
It is apparent that a simple model system, where all players of the holobiont can be identified, isolated, and re-introduced is needed to understand the rule of interdependence and the exception of pathogenesis. To this end, I have developed Hydra as a simple laboratory model system to explore the holobiont, with a particular focus on Hydra-virus interactions.
The thrust of my research is to identify how such a simple animal selects for its viral partners, uses viruses as a defense parameter, and bases this selection using a very well conserved innate immune system.