Microbiome of the Respiratory Tract

Dear Colleagues,

The Human Microbiome Project launched in 2007 to understand the complexity of the human microbiome, leading to  significant growth in understanding the role it plays in health and disease. A large body of evidence now supports the concept that changes in microbiome composition and abundance (dysbiosis) are associated with different pathophysiological conditions by the way it affects metabolic and inflammatory pathways as well as immune response.

There is consequently a growing interest in determining the potential role of the microbiome in disease predisposition, risk, initiation, progression, diagnosis, prognosis, and treatment. Microbial dysbiosis has been found to be involved in a growing list of human diseases, including respiratory diseases. The huge potential of the airway microbiome as a rich source of therapeutic targets and disease progression and clinical outcomes markers is beyond doubt, but it is of fundamental importance to fill gaps in understanding and translate research findings into clinical interventions for direct patient benefit.

As research into the respiratory microbiome continues to grow, several fundamental questions and challenges arise. These include, among others, whether the dysbiotic microbiome of the airway is a cause or effect of the disease; whether the changes in microbiome composition of the lower respiratory tract relate to the clinical manifestation of disease or have predictive value; how the changes in the microbial microenvironment influence pathogenicity of specific species and whether it can be manipulated to change the prognosis; and how to translate findings about the airway microbiota into knowledge about its role in the health and disease process. The challenge facing scientists today is to use the latest technological advances to answer the most pressing questions.

This Special Issue on the microbiome of the respiratory tract invites submissions (research articles and reviews) about such topics. The aim is to gather new research results that aid our understanding of the relationship between the human hosts and their airway microbiome in health and disease.

Dr. Agnieszka Magryś
Dr. Paweł Rybojad
Dr. Michał Kiełbus
Guest Editors

Manuscript Submission Information

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Please visit the Instructions for Authors page before submitting a manuscript. The Article Processing Charge (APC) for publication in this open access journal is 2600 CHF (Swiss Francs). Submitted papers should be well formatted and use good English. Authors may use MDPI's English editing service prior to publication or during author revisions.

• respiratory microbiome
• respiratory diseases
• dysbiosis
• multi-omics
• next-generation sequencing