Welcome to Public Health On Call, a podcast from the Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health,

where we bring evidence, experience, and perspective to make sense of today's leading health challenges.

If you have questions or ideas for us, please send an email to public health question at jh.h.

That's public health question at jh.g.u.edu for future podcast episodes.

Today, our topic is the microbiome. In fact, if there is only one podcast you listened to this year about the microbiome, let

it be this one.

I speak to Yotam Suez, a faculty member here at the Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public

Health, about the billions, I'm sorry, trillions of microorganisms that live inside us and

all over our skin. Do they cause disease? Can they

cure disease? And what do diet sodas have to do with it? Let's listen. Dr. Suez, thank you so much

for joining me to talk about the microbiome. So I know that the microbiome is in our gastrointestinal tract,

but I probably couldn't stand up and give a lecture about it. What is the microbiome from your

perspective as an expert? Well, first of all, Josh, thanks for the opportunity to talk about

the microbiome today.

So when we say microbiome, we think about the trillions of microorganisms that live predominantly in our digestive tract virtually everywhere inside and on top of our body, so also on our skin.

So when we're saying microorganisms, we think about bacteria, but also viruses

and fungi and many other unicellular organisms that are driven our body. And so trillions in each

person? Trillions in each person, but not the same trillions. So I think one of the most exciting

features about the human microbiome is that we each have a distinct human signature.

So you and I, we have different microbes in our body.

And this is why the microbiome is so exciting in terms of medicine,

because we can harness that heterogeneity for multiple aspects of disease prevention and treatment and prediction.

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