The majority of the world’s population lives in environments with many of the same characteristics found in PreMiEr’s Bolivian homes test bed. Building on a foundation of international collaboration and experience, this project partners with Bolivian scientists to conduct a pilot cross-sectional study in the city of La Paz exploring household microbiomes in a setting where engineering controls are minimal. Longer-term goals of the work are to (i) characterize the built environment microbiome in Bolivian households, (ii) evaluate associations with environmental and building characteristics, e.g., construction materials, floor type, or presence of mold, pets and other animals, ventilation, sanitation, water infrastructure; and (iii) develop and implement low-cost engineering controls to reduce exposures in this setting.

One class of biological agents in the indoor environment, fungal molds, is particularly strongly related to exposure to dampness in the indoor environment, and proliferates in areas of inadequate ventilation.  Additionally, climate change is increasing the intensity and frequency of wet weather events, and flooding, both causative agents of fungal mold. This project seeks to increase understanding, measurement, and remediation of fungal mold exposures in built environments.

Antimicrobial resistance (AMR) is an increasing threat to public health and modern medicine. No standard methods exist for measuring antimicrobial resistance in the built environment, and the environmental dimensions of AMR remain poorly understood. This project will develop tools and recommendations for measuring antimicrobial resistance in the built environment, provide insights on the sensitivity of sequencing methods in detecting priority antibiotic resistance genes, and give recommendations for appropriate indicators.

Among potential health risks, water may be an underrecognized but important route of uropathogen transmission causing urinary tract infections (UTIs). This project will conduct a pilot study investigating uropathogenic E. coli in the San Cristobal water system of Galápagos, Ecuador following a documented decrease in UTIs after installation of a new water treatment plant in order to model transmission dynamics of waterborne UTIs.

External collaborators: Galapagos Science Center, Universidad San Francisco de Quito (USFQ)

As we continue to push boundaries of exploration in extreme environments, we must consider the impact that it has on the evolutionary response of the microbes that we carry to the built environment, in this case, outer space or to the lunar surface. This project represents a singular opportunity to study the evolutionary pressures of a novel environment before an associated built environment actually exists. Unique environmental stresses on the adaption of an oral bacterium are studied.

Diet is a key factor shaping the gut microbiome and is also a source of bacteria and pathogens for the household environmental microbiome. However, sampling food intake and microbial communities at the individual household level may be both time-consuming and expensive; such surveys will be costly to scale to community or population levels. This project hypothesizes that households in the same community share similar dietary and microbial patterns, and that variations in food consumption and microbiome are much larger across communities than within them. Thus, as a “community summary”, wastewater treatment plants (WWTPs) become a candidate for estimating and predicting household food consumption and microbiome structure.

Redlining, implemented during the mid-20th century, systematically denied resources and opportunities to communities based on their racial or ethnic composition. Although redlining has officially ended, its lasting consequences continue to shape health outcomes.  The aim of this research project is to investigate the identity of microbes (bacteria, fungi, and viruses) present in redlining districts compared to non-redlining districts in North Carolina and to explore their correlation with diseases commonly found in minoritized populations/groups. By analyzing the microbial composition in these distinct socio-economic areas, we aim to address the knowledge gap regarding the potential impact of historical discriminatory practices on microbial diversity and associated health outcomes.