MIT | No matter where you are, you are surrounded by your microbiome—the
complex biological system of more than 100 trillion microorganisms on
the human body, in airwaves, and in every environment.
“You may not know it, but you’re walking around with two pounds of
microbes on you,” says Bernat Olle SM ’05, MBA ’07, PhD ’07. “But only
recently have scientists discovered how important and how useful they
can be.”
Research in the field of the microbiome is still in its early stages,
but it has already shown that microbes play important roles in
metabolism, digestion, and even mood. And Olle is one of a growing group
of engineers focusing on this area.
“Modern habits have been to clean up and sterilize everything—make it
clean as possible,” he says. “But we’re starting to find out this might
not be a good idea—and we’re abusing anti-microbial chemicals. These
microbial exposures can help develop key human functions.”
Olle is co-founder and COO of Vedanta Biosciences, a Boston-based
startup that researches interactions between the human microbiome and
the immune system. He spoke to Slice of MIT at the 2015 South by
Southwest (SXSW) Interactive, where he was part of a three-person panel that discussed the benefits of microbes and the impact they could have on medicine in the future.
