ot: Our Microbiomes, Ourselves - NYT

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Our Microbiomes, Ourselves

By CARL ZIMMER

http://www.nytimes.com/2011/12/04/opinion/sunday/our-microbiomes-ourselves.html

IMAGINE a scientist gently swabs your left nostril with a Q-tip and

finds that your nose contains hundreds of species of bacteria. That in

itself is no surprise; each of us is home to some 100 trillion microbes.

But then she makes an interesting discovery: in your nose is a

previously unknown species that produces a powerful new antibiotic. Her

university licenses it to a pharmaceutical company; it hits the market

and earns hundreds of millions of dollars. Do you deserve a cut of the

profits?

It is a tricky question, because it defies our traditional notions of

property and justice. You were not born with the germ in your nose; at

some point in your life, it infected you. On the other hand, that

microbe may be able to grow and reproduce only in a human nose. You

provided it with an essential shelter. And its antibiotics may help keep

you healthy, by killing disease-causing germs that attempt to invade

your nose.

Welcome to the confusing new frontier of ethics: our inner ecosystem. In

recent years, scientists have discovered remarkable complexity and power

in the microbes that live inside us. We depend on this so-called

microbiome for our well-being: it helps break down our food, synthesize

vitamins and shield against disease-causing germs.

" We used to think of ourselves as separate from nature, " said mond

, a bioethicist at Mount Sinai School of Medicine. " Now it's not

just us. It's us and them. "

For bioethicists, one of the most important questions....