Alexandre Almeida

Do you want to learn essential GIBA concepts and techniques?

We're hosting three mornings of expert-led sessions on gut, immune and brain research, from 23-26 March 📢🌟

🆓 Open to all across the GIBA Network
📅 Register by 13 March!

🔗 giba-uk.org/events/the-g...

'Hidden' group of gut bacteria may be essential to good health Scientists have pinpointed a group of bacteria that consistently appear in high numbers in healthy people, suggesting that these could one day be targeted through diet or probiotics

🔬 New insights from gut-immune-brain research 🌟

A study with our network's @alexmsalmeida.bsky.social uncovers a "hidden” gut bacterial group found in higher levels in healthy people.

Could this be key to microbiome health and future probiotic innovation? 🌍🦠
www.newscientist.com/article/2514...

Congratulations to @alexmsalmeida.bsky.social and his research team at the @camvetschool.bsky.social on their latest paper exploring the ‘hidden’ microbes in our gut.

Discover more about their fascinating findings on the University of Cambridge Research website 👇🏽
www.cam.ac.uk/research/new...

‘Hidden’ bugs in our gut appear key to good health, finds global study An understudied group of bacteria in our gut microbiome appears to play a central role in keeping us healthy, according to researchers at the University of

Is there a missing link in our gut health? 🦠

New research from Alexandre Almeida’s lab has uncovered a ‘hidden group’ of bacteria - known as CAG-170 - that appears to be an indicator of human health.

Read the full story: www.cam.ac.uk/research/new...

@alexmsalmeida.bsky.social

I still find it mad that even though pretty much everyone now knows what a gut microbiome is and might think we have a pretty good idea of what's going on in there, we still don't have much clue about the majority of species in our guts, saying they are part of the "hidden microbiome"

Meta-analysis of the uncultured gut microbiome across 11,115 global metagenomes reveals a candidate signature of health Silva et al. perform a global analysis of over 11,000 gut microbiomes and reveal that uncultured bacteria are key markers of gut health. The uncultured genus CAG-170 is strongly linked to low gut dysb...

The original research was published today in Cell Host & Microbe www.cell.com/cell-host-mi...

Thanks to @chrisnsimms.bsky.social and the @newscientist.com for covering our new work on the uncultured microbiome in @cp-cellhostmicrobe.bsky.social. It was great chatting more about the implications of our findings!

Thanks for the shoutout Guillaume!

Meta-analysis of the uncultured gut microbiome across 11,115 global metagenomes reveals a candidate signature of health The human gut microbiome is important for host health, yet over 60% of gut species remain uncultured and inaccessible to experimental manipulation. He…

Great work again from @alexmsalmeida.bsky.social et al highlights uncultured genus CAG-170 (Oscillospiraceae) to be central node in healthy co-abundance networks in >11k gut metagenomes, with predicted B12 biosynthesis/cross-feeding functions possibly involved.
www.sciencedirect.com/science/arti...

Thank you to @camvetschool.bsky.social and the Medical Research Council @ukri.org for their support!

We believe this work has important implications for the microbiome field by raising awareness that hidden, understudied members of the human gut microbiome may actually have a relevant role in health.

By investigating the functional and metabolic capacity of CAG-170 and related genomes, we predicted that CAG-170 has a particularly high capacity to produce vitamin B12 and appears to be strongly involved in cross-feeding interactions within the gut microbiome.

We discovered three key signals: (1) CAG-170 showed the strongest association with health compared to other taxa; (2) CAG-170 was the most interconnected genus in healthy microbiomes; and (3) CAG-170 abundance was negatively correlated with the level of gut dysbiosis.

From all our analyses, one group consistently popped up: CAG-170. This is a largely uncultured bacterial genus (the vast majority of genomes are exclusively represented by MAGs), so there is currently limited knowledge on what it is and what it is able to do.

By pinpointing individual species linked to this signal, we found that the uncultured microbiome in general was most strongly associated with health compared to disease.

Using machine learning approaches, we first found that models using the uncultured microbiome performed better for disease classification in both within- and between-disease comparisons, highlighting its potential clinical value.

To address this, we performed a large-scale meta-analysis of 11,115 human gut metagenomes across multiple countries and clinical conditions to investigate both shared and specific patterns of the uncultured microbiome in health and disease.

A new genomic blueprint of the human gut microbiota - Nature The known species repertoire of the collective human gut microbiota is substantially expanded with the discovery of 1,952 uncultured bacterial species that greatly improve classification of understudi...

Building upon the discovery of thousands of uncultured species in the human gut microbiome (www.nature.com/articles/s41... & www.nature.com/articles/s41...), we wanted to ask: what is the clinical relevance of this understudied diversity?

Meta-analysis of the uncultured gut microbiome across 11,115 global metagenomes reveals a candidate signature of health Silva et al. perform a global analysis of over 11,000 gut microbiomes and reveal that uncultured bacteria are key markers of gut health. The uncultured genus CAG-170 is strongly linked to low gut dysb...

Excited to share the newest paper from our team, where we uncovered a potential role of the uncultured gut #microbiome in health: www.cell.com/cell-host-mi.... Out now in @cp-cellhostmicrobe.bsky.social @cellpress.bsky.social. With Ana C. da Silva, Jacob Lapkin, Qi Yin and Efrat Muller.

The human gut microbiome in enteric infections: from association to translation Enteric infections remain a leading global cause of morbidity, mortality and economic loss, increasingly compounded by the rise of antimicrobial resistance. The gut microbiome — spanning bacteria, ...

Our team wrote a review for Gut Microbes on the role of the gut #microbiome in modulating enteric infections. Great team effort by Qi Yin, @samriddhigupta.bsky.social and Efrat Muller: www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10....

Excited to be speaking at this ECR Symposium in Nottingham. Free to attend!

We have a fully-funded PhD studentship available to elucidate the host-adaptive traits of the human gut microbiome: bbsrcdtp.lifesci.cam.ac.uk/how-apply (targeted project: TRG-VET-AA26).

Feel free to reach out with a CV and cover letter stating your interest in this project.

Applications to our free course on "Introduction to Experimental Design and Core Statistics" closes this Friday. Part of the @ukgibanetwork.bsky.social, this is a great opportunity to improve your statistical skills and get to meet other network members.

Apply here: forms.office.com/e/sdys5HATUH

Applications to the first training event: "Introduction to Experimental Design and Core Statistics" of the UK GIBA Network+ (@ukgibanetwork.bsky.social) are now open! Taking place Dec 8-10 in Cambridge.

Further info: www.giba-uk.org/training-opp...
Apply here: forms.office.com/Pages/Respon...

📊 Want to boost your research skills?

Join our 3-day training on Experimental Design and Core Statistics in Cambridge (Dec 8–10).

✅ Free to attend
🙋‍♀️ Open to all career stages
🚆 Travel and accommodation costs reimbursed

Apply by October 17th 👉 www.giba-uk.org/training-opp...

Our working groups support the development of effective collaborations across the UK to advance research.

Introduced by Franziska Denk (@denklab.bsky.social) at our #GIBANetworklaunch.

Want to know our first 5️⃣ topics? Find out here 👇
www.giba-uk.org/working-groups

✔️ Flexible funds
✔️ Fellowships
✔️ Mobility awards

Our director Jonathan Swann shares some of the ways we will expand the mechanistic understanding of the gut-immune-brain axis.

More details will appear on our Network website in the coming days 👇
www.giba-uk.org/funding-oppo... #GIBANetworklaunch

“One of the key pillars of our network is training,” says
@alexmsalmeida.bsky.social.

We are committed to equip our members with the skills, tools and methods essential for research.

Our first course was announced at our #GIBANetworklaunch 🌟

Want to know more? 👇
🔗 giba-uk.org/training-opp...

Representing the bioinformatics crowd at the #GIBANetworklaunch

The past two decades have seen a global explosion of research into the gut-immune-brain axis.

There is great energy in #Southampton today for our #GIBANetworklaunch.

Together, we are building a vibrant and diverse research community to fully realise GIBA's potential.

Learn more 👉 www.giba-uk.org