The Development of Microbial Organisms in the House Was Influenced by Specific Factors

According to a recent study, the development of microbial organisms in the house was influenced by specific factors: geographic location, people and pets. The study was published in the journal Proceedings of the Royal Society B.

Associate professor in the Department of Ecology and Evolutionary Biology at CU-Boulder and co-author of the study, Noah Fierer, said that the fungi and bacteria in our homes’ dust encompass a vast array of micro-organisms, whereas his team’s study aim was to categorize that specific diversity.

Moreover, these microbial organisms may prove beneficial in the end, as children develop strong immune systems which fight allergies later on, despite the fact that bacteria can be bad for our health as well.

Prof. Fierer collected dust from the door frames’ top, in order to observe how bacteria and fungi influence our overall health, during their project entitled Wild Life of Our Homes. The communities of these micro-organisms were collected from approximately 1,200 homes across the US. The scientific team analyzed different types of homes, from several climatic areas.

Fierer’s team discovered approximately 125,000 types of bacteria and 70,000 fungi varieties during the study. An interesting finding was that indoor bacteria and fungi were more diverse than the outdoor ones, as the indoor types tend to be brought into the house through soil and leaves.

The research team also pointed out that different geographic locations harbor different types of fungi and bacteria. They also revealed the fact that these micro-organisms varied according to whether more men or more women lived in those houses. For instance, skin bacteria would be harbored in households with more men. Hygiene practices and skin biology in both men and women differed, thus the types of bacteria being different and more or less prevalent as well.

If people owned a pet, it would influence the types and numbers of fungal and bacterial communities. People who had a dog displayed 56 different variants of bacteria in their homes, whereas cat owners gave rise to 24 variants of micro-organisms in their households.

The scientific team finally pointed out that their concise analysis and overall study would prove utterly useful in providing information on how our home environment roughly influences our well-being.

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