Harris Wang

10 days until the deadline!

illustration of petri dishes growing different microbes

We're excited to help launch the inaugural Gordon research conference on #microbiome editing, coming up in January in Pomona, CA! Learn more and register here: https://ow.ly/a6Am50X9XkE

Engineered probiotic restores GLP-1 signaling to ameliorate fiber-deficiency exacerbated colitis Engineered probiotic delivers bacterial peptide that enhances GLP-1 and restores barrier integrity in diet-modulated colitis.

Highlighting another recent paper from the lab in Science Advances on engineering a gut probiotic to modulate GLP-1 levels and ameliorating colitis. Led by Leonie Brockmann & @carlottaronda.bsky.social . @columbiasysbio.bsky.social @columbiauniversity.bsky.social 🧬🦠💊
www.science.org/doi/full/10....

Fecal exfoliome sequencing captures immune dynamics of the healthy and inflamed gut - Nature Biotechnology Profiling host RNA shed in feces reveals disease states in the gut.

Fecal exfoliome sequencing captures immune dynamics of the healthy and inflamed gut - @harriswang.bsky.social go.nature.com/4i7XnZR

We are excited for many apps of Foli-seq in academia & industry. Please reach out to collaborate! Lots of exciting projects in this space for students & postdocs. Led by Yiming @yiminghuang.bsky.social and Yiwei @yiweisun.bsky.social & thanks to all our collaborators!
@columbiasysbio.bsky.social

In 💩 samples from patients with Inflammatory Bowel Disease (IBD) from the @crohnscolitisfdn.bsky.social, we can distinguish different patient cohorts with increase clinical severity of disease and stratifying biomarkers that associated with immune pathway involvement.

Each day, humans shed billons of host cells from the gut lining out of the body (our "exfoliome") via our poop. Foli-seq unlocks this non-invasive exfoliome analysis to assess gut and immune functions, and links with the gut microbiome, all w/o colonoscopy or tissue biopsy. 💩🧬

Fecal exfoliome sequencing captures immune dynamics of the healthy and inflamed gut - Nature Biotechnology Profiling host RNA shed in feces reveals disease states in the gut.

Introducing Foli-seq in @natbiotech.nature.com today. Foli-seq can be used to measure gut-derived RNA from fecal matter (signals of immune, secretory & epithelial cells). We used this to map gut inflammation, drug response, and host-microbe interactions. 💩🧬💊🦠
www.nature.com/articles/s41...

📢 Our Dept. of Systems Biology at Columbia University has an open tenure-track Assistant Professor position in the broad area of quantitative biology. Come join our awesome department in NYC! Please circulate.
apply.interfolio.com/177622
Suggested deadline: 12/15/2025.
@columbiasysbio.bsky.social

Metagenomic editing of commensal bacteria in vivo using CRISPR-associated transposases Although metagenomic sequencing has revealed a rich microbial biodiversity in the mammalian gut, methods to genetically alter specific species in the microbiome are highly limited. Here, we introduce ...

1/9 Metagenomics lets us read microbiomes in nature without cultivation, but writing (editing) them in their native context is still a major challenge.

Meet MetaEdit: a platform for pathway-scale metagenomic editing inside the gut microbiome. science.org/doi/10.1126/...

Programmable DNA insertion in native gut bacteria A gene-editing approach enables modification of bacteria within the mouse gut

also, an excellent perspective by @dbikard.bsky.social summarizing the work! 🙏
www.science.org/doi/10.1126/...

We are hiring PhD & Postdocs in this space so please reach out if interested. Also check out the Gordon Research Conference on Microbiome Editing in Jan 11-16, 2026.
www.grc.org/microbiome-e...

Precise virulence inactivation using a CRISPR-associated transposase for combating Enterobacteriaceae gut pathogens - Nature Biomedical Engineering A self-transmissible CRISPR-associated transposase system encodes a nanobody payload to treat Shiga toxin infections.

This new work in commensal microbes and our other recent work to engineer pathogenic bacteria to reduce virulence in the gut are greatly expanding our toolkit for in vivo microbiome editing. 🛠️🧬🦠
www.nature.com/articles/s41...

Led by the stellar Diego Gelsinger @drgel.bsky.social working with many contributors through a wonderful long-term collab w/ Sam Sternberg & Ivo Ivanov labs! 🤝 @columbiauniversity.bsky.social
@columbiasysbio.bsky.social

Metagenomic editing of commensal bacteria in vivo using CRISPR-associated transposases Although metagenomic sequencing has revealed a rich microbial biodiversity in the mammalian gut, methods to genetically alter specific species in the microbiome are highly limited. Here, we introduce ...

Very excited to share our latest work in Science on metagenomic editing (MetaEdit) of the gut microbiome in vivo & directly modifying unculturable immune-modulatory SFB bug in the small intestine. 🦠🧬🛠️
www.science.org/doi/10.1126/...

Biographical Manga Highlights Scientist Harris Wang’s Superhero Microbiome Work Discover how immigrant scientist Harris Wang, PhD, uses synthetic biology to reprogram gut bacteria in this manga by Hiroki Otsuka.

Grateful to work with the wonderful
@vilcekfoundation.bsky.social and the super talented Hiroki Otsuka on a short manga highlighting our research and my journey as an immigrant scientist! 🧪🦠🧬
vilcek.org/news/microbe...

Congrats Bryan!!

Yikes… NIH dropping IC to 15%
grants.nih.gov/grants/guide...

SAMPL-seq reveals micron-scale spatial hubs in the human gut microbiome - Nature Microbiology Split-And-pool Metagenomic Plot-sampling sequencing (SAMPL-seq) can be applied to complex microbial communities to reveal spatial co-localization of microbes at the micron scale.

Happy to share our new paper in @naturemicrobiol.bsky.social on mapping spatial relationships of the human gut microbiome. We identified distinct spatial hubs between gut bacteria that reflect sub-community assemblies at the micron-scale. Led by Miles Richardson & co.
www.nature.com/articles/s41...

I hear ya! I mean more on the “we” rather than “I” personally in some of these sentiments. Again, this is not meant as a substitute for things we do or aught to do already but something that can augment. Also, just an idea to stimulate conversations.

I like your ideas, just trying to think of ways that I can donate my “time” to help specific labs/areas that might even be outside of my immediate area of expertise. Seems like having a universal currency for science might have some uses. It’s obviously imperfect, but maybe could refine the ideas.

I think the idea is that you can compensate others with your credits/tokens like pay for reagents (service contracts on equipment!!). There are lots of misc expenses in running a lab that add up!

May not push the incentives to a point where people will review more, but at least extend the effort of the review to benefit not only the authors (or the journals) but broaden impact to others through the peer review process. It’s like volunteering time and using earned credits to give to others.

‘Getting paid to review is justice’: journal pays peer reviewers in cryptocurrency ResearchHub Journal launches latest attempt to compensate referees for their labour.

Looks like there is some momentum to this concept: www.nature.com/articles/d41...

The problem is that people don’t have time to review. It’s not clear how you easily “fact check” papers in bio (unless there are massive flaws). Critiques of strengths & weaknesses are still useful. Most people aren’t volunteering time to review biorxiv papers. Maybe this system can be an incentive.

Credits used back to invest in science community rather than on direct personal benefit.

I recognize that this idea is still underdeveloped but wanted to start share it here. Would love to hear feedback and find people willing to help do something like this! Thanks for reading! (9/9)

I can imagine this framework on a blockchain to track credits or tokens and you can have people invest in buying the tokens directly to further add to this community (basically a donation). Lots of ways to grow this organically. The economics need to be figured out in more detail. (8/9)

Importantly you can DONATE these credits to other labs or entities. What if there’s a cool project from another lab that I want to support? I can donate my science credits to them so it can advance the science. You basically converted ↔️ PR time/effort into communal goods for sharing w/ others. (7/9)

The SOLUTION:💡What if we gave reviewers some type of “science credits” after peer review. Sci-credits can be exchanged for all kinds of science related activities. For example: publication fees, society/conference fees, discount on purchasing reagents or repair cost of equipment. (6/9)