1. Solutions in microbiome engineering: prioritizing barriers to organism establishment
- Author
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Albright, Michaeline BN, Louca, Stilianos, Winkler, Daniel E, Feeser, Kelli L, Haig, Sarah-Jane, Whiteson, Katrine L, Emerson, Joanne B, and Dunbar, John
- Subjects
Agriculture ,Ecology ,Microbiota ,Environmental Sciences ,Biological Sciences ,Technology ,Microbiology - Abstract
Microbiome engineering is increasingly being employed as a solution to challenges in health, agriculture, and climate. Often manipulation involves inoculation of new microbes designed to improve function into a preexisting microbial community. Despite, increased efforts in microbiome engineering inoculants frequently fail to establish and/or confer long-lasting modifications on ecosystem function. We posit that one underlying cause of these shortfalls is the failure to consider barriers to organism establishment. This is a key challenge and focus of macroecology research, specifically invasion biology and restoration ecology. We adopt a framework from invasion biology that summarizes establishment barriers in three categories: (1) propagule pressure, (2) environmental filtering, and (3) biotic interactions factors. We suggest that biotic interactions is the most neglected factor in microbiome engineering research, and we recommend a number of actions to accelerate engineering solutions.
- Published
- 2022