Journal Article

The Lung Microbiome. A New Frontier in Pulmonary Medicine

Kiley, James P., Caler, Elisabet V.

2014

Overview

The 56th Thomas L. Petty Aspen Lung Conference meeting held at the Gant Conference Center from Jun 5-8, 2013 brought together the community of microbiologists, basic respiratory scientists, and pulmonary clinicians to present and discuss the latest developments in the emerging area of the lung microbiome. The conference organizers, Richard Martin, Monica Kraft, and Sonia C. Flores, convened and led an outstanding meeting. It is almost impossible to capture all the content and details presented over the 3-day meeting. At best, one can attempt to capture some of the key themes, recognized gaps, and notable areas for future research, which we have attempted to do in this summary. The use of state-of-the art culture-independent techniques has enabled tremendous growth in understanding the microbial communities that reside in the lungs and in the respiratory tract and the relationship between them. This understanding can only be expected to increase in this nascent but burgeoning area of lung research as technology continues to improve and become more accessible.

• Publisher: American Thoracic Society
• Subject: Conference Summary / Congresses as Topic / Humans / Lung - microbiology / Metagenome / Microbiota / Pulmonary Medicine - trends