A chance chat with a colleague pulled social psychologist Kieran O’Doherty into the realm of human microbiome research. O’Doherty’s colleague was organizing a workshop on human microbiome research and needed a social scientist, so he asked O’Doherty to join in. Captivated by the sea of questions facing microbiologists as they made their first forays into a field with novel human health implications, O’Doherty found much to investigate at the intersection of people and research. One of his current projects focuses on women’s health and the vaginal microbiome. His microbiologist colleagues focus on correlating microbiotic profiles with outcomes like preterm birth, while O’Doherty surveys the women about their sex lives, diet, and hygiene behaviors, hoping to ferret out what activities led to their specific profiles in the first place. In this issue’s Thought Experiment, O’Doherty enumerates the ethical questions posed by human microbiome research, such as designer babies created via microbiome ...
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