The built environment and microbiome in human health - insights from everyday life and the hospital environment

Our lives are influenced by something invisible: the microbiome. It plays a key role in both health and disease¹, and the environment shapes our microbiome while we release microbes into it². To explore the environment–human microbiome connection, we are investigating two complementary settings. First, to trace microbiome exchange during short-term stays in extreme built environments, we collected 731 hospital samples and 231 from patients’ hand skin. Second, to assess how daily exposure and lifestyle influence the microbiome, we collected 213 fecal and 213 urine samples from residents of a Milan district (Italy), along with detailed lifestyle data. Samples are undergoing DNA extraction and high-throughput microbiome analysis. Preliminary results show that outpatients’ skin acquired hospital-associated microbes and vice versa. Our work has potential implications for infection control, preventive medicine, and urban health policy.