Ep 54: The Promises and Perils of the Microbiome - Dr. Jonathan Eisen and Jessica Richman

Jan 6, 2015

By popular demand, an entire episode dedicated to exploring the microbiome! Are you really 90% bacteria and 10% human? How can you manage or optimize your own microbiome? Should we do fecal-matter transplants from "untouched" indigenous tribes to reverse chronic illness? We tackle all this and much more. Jessica Richman is co-founder and CEO of uBiome, a startup backed by Y Combinator and Andreesen Horowitz, which uses citizen science to understand the human microbiome. Jessica attended Stanford University, where she earned degrees in economics and interdisciplinary engineering. She then got a fellowship to Oxford University for her PhD in computational social science. Her work has been featured in Wired, Popular Science, MIT Technology Review, NYT, and dozens of other media outlets. Jonathan Eisen is a Full Professor at the University of California, Davis with appointments in the School of Medicine and the College of Biological Sciences. Dr. Eisen’s research focuses on the evolution, ecology and function of communities of microorganisms. His study systems have included boiling acid pools, surface ocean waters, buildings, agents of many diseases, and the microbial ecosystems (also known as microbiomes) that are found living in and on plants and animals. In addition to his research, Dr. Eisen is a vocal advocate for “open science” especially “open access” to scientific publications. He earned a Ph.D. in Biological Sciences from Stanford University and an A.B. in Biology from Harvard College. 

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