无菌动物与宏基因组技术是驱动人体健康微生物组研究的两大车轮。没有无菌动物菌群（株）移植模型，就无法确立菌群与疾病的因果关系；没有无菌动物，就没有菌群与人体疾病研究飞速发展的今天与明天。无菌动物应用已形成有菌与无菌动物比较、菌群（株）移植、基因工程动物无菌化、无菌动物发育四种通用研究模式，研究模式的标准化将加大无菌动物研究应用规模及速度。本课题组经过十余年努力，已建成国内最具影响力的无菌动物平台，为国内生物医学、畜牧、食品微生物组科学问题解决提供了有力支撑。但是,目前我国无菌动物规模小、效率低、供用平台与应用条件分离，无菌动物基础理论与技术体系尚待发展，难以满足日益增长的应用需求。亟待建立规模化无菌动物高效研究应用体系，加强无菌动物基础研究，加强无菌动物应用推广，以适应我国微生物组研究高速发展。

Gastric cancer (GC) is a common cancer in Asian, which arises due to a combination of genetic and environmental factors. Chronic inflammation with Helicobacter pylori is a major risk factor for GC. However, only about 3% of H. pylori-infected people develop GC. Changes in gastric microbial composition are associated with GC, but the role of bacteria other than H. pylori is yet to be established. We seek to characterize the microbial changes associated with histologic stages of gastric tumorigenesis. We performed 16S rRNA gene analysis of gastric mucosal samples from 81 cases including superficial gastritis (SG), atrophic gastritis (AG), intestinal metaplasia (IM) and gastric cancer (GC), to determine mucosal microbiome dysbiosis across stages of GC. We validated the results in mucosal samples of 126 cases from Inner Mongolia, China. Moreover, we identified differences in bacterial interactions across stages of gastric carcinogenesis in addition to microbial compositional changes. The significant enrichments and network centralities suggest potentially important roles of P. stomatis, D. pneumosintes, S. exigua, P. micra and S. anginosus in gastric cancer progression (Gut 2018). To identify non-H. pylori gastric microbes that are associated with inflammation, GA and IM post-treatment of H. pylori infection, we evaluated a total of 295 cases received one-week course omeprazole, amoxicillin and clarithromycin (OAC) while 292 cases received placebo. Subjects underwent endoscopy with biopsy at baseline and after one year. We demonstrated that Oral bacterial genera Peptostreptococcus, Streptococcus, Parvimonas, Prevotella and Porphyromonas are associated with the progression of gastric inflammation, GA and IM following anti-H. pylori therapy. Treatment targeting these bacteria may be prescribed to patients to reduce the risk of developing gastric cancer (unpublished data). The findings may help to provide new insights for the molecular pathogenesis of gastric carcinogenesis, the potential diagnostic bacteria markers for GC and the control of this major malignance.

The Center for Translational Microbiome Research (CTMR) started in January 2016 as a collaboration between Karolinska Institutet, Science for Life Laboratory and Ferring Pharmaceuticals. Since then, a broad technical, biological, clinical and epidemiological platform for studying complex microbiological communities in well-defined human materials has been established. CTMR aims to better understand the contribution of the human microbiome to physiology and pathophysiology with the goal to open opportunities for development of novel therapies in the area of gastroenterology and reproductive health. The talk will present details on CTMR´s efforts to define what is healthy in the human gut and vaginal microbiome and approaches to develop therapies or lifestyle interventions to change a dysbiotic profile back to normal again.