The Human Microbiome Project (HMP) was a United States National Institutes of Health (NIH) research initiative to improve understanding of the microbiota involved in human health and disease. Launched in 2007, the first phase (HMP1) focused on identifying and characterizing human microbiota. The second phase, known as the Integrative Human Microbiome Project (iHMP) launched in 2014 with the aim of generating resources to characterize the microbiome and elucidating the roles of microbes in health and disease states. The program received $170 million in funding by the NIH Common Fund from 2007 to 2016.
Depiction of prevalences of various classes of bacteria at selected sites on human skin
Microbiota are the range of microorganisms that may be commensal, mutualistic, or pathogenic found in and on all multicellular organisms, including plants. Microbiota include bacteria, archaea, protists, fungi, and viruses, and have been found to be crucial for immunologic, hormonal, and metabolic homeostasis of their host.
Diverse microbial communities of characteristic microbiota are part of plant microbiomes, and are found on the outside surfaces and in the internal tissues of the host plant, as well as in the surrounding soil.
The predominant species of bacteria on human skin
Light micrograph of a cross section of a coralloid root of a cycad, showing the layer that hosts symbiotic cyanobacteria
Bleached branching coral (foreground) and normal branching coral (background). Keppel Islands, Great Barrier Reef.