Definition of microbiome
1 : a community of microorganisms (such as bacteria, fungi, and viruses) that inhabit a particular environment and especially the collection of microorganisms living in or on the human body Your body is home to about 100 trillion bacteria and other microbes, collectively known as your microbiome. — Carl Zimmer … what's arguably become the hottest area of medicine: microbiome research, an emerging field that's investigating how the bacteria that live in and on our bodies affect our health. — Sunny Sea Gold
2 : the collective genomes of microorganisms inhabiting a particular environment and especially the human body They form one community among the many that make up the human microbiome: the full genetic complement of bacteria and other organisms at home on your skin, gums, and teeth, in your genital tract, and especially in your gut. — Nathan Wolfe
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Recent Examples of microbiome from the Web
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The finding is the latest to link our health to the microbes that share our bodies, what’s called the microbiome.
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Hydration, on the other hand, helps protect the physical barrier and maintain a healthy microbiome.
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Then there is the microbiome, the trillion-cell ecosystem of microbes that lives inside all of us, contributing to our health in largely mysterious ways.
These example sentences are selected automatically from various online news sources to reflect current usage of the word 'microbiome'. Views expressed in the examples do not represent the opinion of Merriam-Webster or its editors. Send us feedback.
Medical Dictionary
microbiome
playMedical Definition of microbiome
1: a community of microorganisms (such as bacteria, fungi, and viruses) that inhabit a particular environment and especially the collection of microorganisms living in or on the human body The intestinal microbiome consists of the microorganisms that inhabit the gut.—Clara Abraham et al., The New England Journal of Medicine, 19 Nov. 2009 Collectively known as the microbiome, this community may play a role in regulating one's risk of obesity, asthma and allergies.—Carrie Arnold, Scientific American, March 2012 The human oral microbiome comprises all microbial species in the oral cavity.—Naomi P. O'Grady, The Journal of the American Medical Association, 20 June 2012
2: the collective genomes of microorganisms inhabiting a particular environment and especially the human body As part of a new citizen-science initiative called the American Gut project, the lab sequenced my microbiome—that is, the genes not of “me,” exactly, but of the several hundred microbial species with whom I share this body.—Michael Pollan, The New York Times, 19 May 2013 Together, the genomes of these microbial symbionts (collectively defined as the microbiome) provide traits that humans did not need to evolve on their own.—Peter J. Turnbaugh et al., Nature, 18 Oct. 2007
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