Dr. Felipa Godoy-Vitorino, an Associate Professor and Principal Investigator at the Inter American University of Puerto Rico, brought us a seminar on Microbiome research. We learned that humans have 10X more bacterial cells than "Homo sapiens" cells and 100% more bacterial genes, which means that medicine is now being viewed through the eyes of microbial ecology. She focused on the importance of Microbes to human health and how they can be linked to obesity, autism and other issues. Did you know Ulcerative Colitis can be treated through fecal transplants from a healthy donor? And how wonderful are Lactobacillus, protecting us from viral infections?  

Besides traveling through the microbial components of the human body, she also exposed how animal guts and soils can be used as source of enzymes for the biofuel industry, and how root microbes may contribute to overturning global warming. It was indeed an ecological journey to the minuscule microbial world. We thank Rotarian Jose Duarte for bringing us this fascinating program.