Thanks ABC AU for the interesting picture of gut microflora (original here by Charles Mackay - please don't sue me, I'll take it down if you don't like it! Disclaimers -->).
I'm using this picture because this new (open) editorial review doesn't have any.
One of the expanding areas that some of us might be grouping under the "proteogenomics" umbrella is "metaproteomics" -- this is the proteomic analysis of communities of organisms. In a demonstration of my limited imagination I'd only thought of it in terms of the outdoor environment -- and there is some awesome work going on out there in our streams and oceans and soil.
This Editorial reminded me that each one of us are a ecological community of microbes! And it talks about how we can use these approaches to study human and animal gut microbes and apply this knowledge to our understanding of diseases. It is pretty well accepted out there that the microbes we're carrying (or...from a pure numbers standpoint...are caring for the relatively small number of human cells around them...) have a lot to do with our susceptibility to diseases and our compensation to our external environments. So...this is a completely new field (to me) that sounds very worth exploring.
On a similar note, do you know about this company?
It is like 23andME but for your genetic analysis of your own microbiome. This is not an endorsement. I've had a kit for months and keep forgetting about it...but it's a great addition for those of us who don't believe in having too much information!
I got segwayed there, but I do recommend this interesting and short editorial. It does get you thinking!
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