(l to r) Bruce Clarke, Moamen Elmassry, Michael San Francisco, Anisha Navlekar, John Feldman

Lubbock, Texas, April 12, 2018
Texas Tech University

A note from John Feldman

I had a wonderful time on Thursday April 12 with several professors and grad students, at Texas Tech in Lubbock, Texas. Prof. Michael San Francisco, who hosted the film along with Texas Tech University, was a student of Lynn Margulis’ at Boston University and told me that when he was a young student just arriving from India, she took an interest in him and helped him develop his career.

Prior to the screening, I had a whirlwind day visiting with professors and grad students in biology and the humanities.

The screening went very well (and included an intermission with a very student-friendly buffet). After the screening Michael San Francisco, Prof. Bruce Clarke and I had a brief discussion with the audience about the importance of talking about metaphors in Margulis’ world, the microbiome, Barbara McClintock, truth in science, and other topics.

After the screening I had a discussion with grad students Moamen Elmassry and Anisha Navlekar about the relative importance of nature vs. nurture in a person’s microbiome. I wondered if my microbiome was closer to my wife’s or my sister’s (who lives in a different community). Moamen and Anisha were quite convinced it was my wife’s, because we are sharing our symbionts with each other and with the environment. I wasn’t sure.

The next day I received an e-mail from Moamen Elmassry with some pertinent research papers that helped me to see that, while my sister’s microbiome and my microbiome may have been very similar when we were infants and even youngsters, the environmental separation has allowed them to diverge.

My name is Moamen Elmassry, we met yesterday for lunch and the film screening. I am a PhD student in Dr. Michael San Francisco lab. I really can’t express how much I loved the film, it was really moving and motivating, especially at this phase of my life as a graduate student. Thank you so much for the amazing work and the time and effort you put in it.

Regarding what we talked about yesterday, I have found actually research already answering our questions and thought to share it with you.

The first question is related to the microbiome of humans and chimpanzees
“Rapid changes in the gut microbiome during human evolution”
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4246287/#__ffn_sectitle

The second question about households and nature vs nurture in shaping the microbiome, there is a lot of research in this area, but here is 2 recent articles that show the effect of the environment on the microbiome.
“Environment dominates over host genetics in shaping human gut microbiota”
https://www.nature.com/articles/nature25973
“Cohabiting family members share microbiota with one another and with their dogs”
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3628085/

Thank you again.

Regards,
Moamen Elmassry
Ph.D. Student | Graduate Teaching Assistant

Thanks, Moamen, for this great information. During my conversations with professors and students throughout the day, I was excited to see the predominance of systems thinking and so many view points that Lynn Margulis championed.