ArticleThe ISME journal2012
Architectural design influences the diversity and structure of the built environment microbiome.
Article in The ISME journal, 2012. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Cited by 210 papers, 3 of them syntheses that pooled it.
What it found
Each row is one number read from the abstract, on the scale the paper reported it, with its interval. Left of the dashed line favours the treatment, right favours the comparator. Under each row is the sentence it came from. New to these charts? A ten-minute tutorial.
The abstract states no effect estimate the extractor could read, or names no intervention and outcome on the map, so this paper lights no cell and moves no belief. It is still indexed, cited and linked below.
The trial behind it
Trials whose registry record cites this paper, or whose number appears in the abstract. A trial that started after this paper was published is citing it as background, not reporting it.
Neither the registry nor the abstract names a trial number. If this is a trial report, that itself is worth knowing.
Who cites it
210 citing papers in PubMed, 3 syntheses or guidelines pooled it.
- Pooled it
- Global Meta-analysis of Airborne Bacterial Communities and Associations with Anthropogenic Activities.Environmental science & technology · 2022Pooled it
- Microbiota of the indoor environment: a meta-analysis.Microbiome · 2015Pooled it
- Metabolic Design Patterns for a Regenerative Architecture.Microbial biotechnology · 2026Review
- Multidimensional Profiles of Microbial Contamination and Hygiene Risk Across Functional Areas in Family Hotels.Life (Basel, Switzerland) · 2026Article
- Beyond Infection-Indoor Airborne Pathogens as Contributors to Respiratory Inflammation and Immune Dysregulation: A Narrative Review.Pathogens (Basel, Switzerland) · 2026Review
- Microbial Contamination of Gym Equipment: Diversity Patterns, Temporal Dynamics, Staphylococcus Hotspots, and Device-Level Risk Indices.Pathogens (Basel, Switzerland) · 2026Observational
- Associations of indoor bacterial, metabolomic, and other chemical exposures with allergic rhinitis in school-aged children.BMC microbiology · 2026Article
- Human Contact Frequency as a Dominant Ecological Driver of Fungal Community Assembly and Homogenization in Public Built Environments.Journal of microbiology and biotechnology · 2026Article
- Microbial landscape: composition and health associations of environmental microbiome in key functional spaces of premium elderly care facilities.Microbiology spectrum · 2026Article
- Cigarette Butts as an Emerging Urban Habitat Driving Microbial Niche Differentiation.Research (Washington, D.C.) · 2026Article
- Reconsidering indoor radon monitoring strategies in Romanian medical buildings: a data-driven perspective.Frontiers in public health · 2026Article
- The archibiome: extending engineered living materials to multiscale built environments.Frontiers in systems biology · 2026Article
- Air Bacterial Microbiomes in Hospitals: Case Studies from a Metropolis and a Small City of Thailand.Computational and structural biotechnology journal · 2026Article
- Review
- Characterization of the bacterial and fungal diversity in habitats of Corsica Island.Applied and environmental microbiology · 2025Article
- Occupants and surface types drive microbial dynamics in controlled indoor environments.Environmental microbiome · 2025Article
- Microbial signatures and ARGs profiles in two coastal ecosystems of Shenzhen under distinct anthropogenic influences.iScience · 2025Article
- Genomic description ofmSystems · 2025Article
- Skin Microbiome Overview: How Physical Activity Influences Bacteria.Microorganisms · 2025Review
150 more citing papers are in PubMed but not listed here.
Corrections and comments
PubMed lists nothing against this paper. Absence here is not a guarantee, only a check that was made.
Authors and funding
9 authors.
Funding
No grant is acknowledged in the PubMed record.
Abstract
Buildings are complex ecosystems that house trillions of microorganisms interacting with each other, with humans and with their environment. Understanding the ecological and evolutionary processes that determine the diversity and composition of the built environment microbiome--the community of microorganisms that live indoors--is important for understanding the relationship between building design, biodiversity and human health. In this study, we used high-throughput sequencing of the bacterial 16S rRNA gene to quantify relationships between building attributes and airborne bacterial communities at a health-care facility. We quantified airborne bacterial community structure and environmental conditions in patient rooms exposed to mechanical or window ventilation and in outdoor air. The phylogenetic diversity of airborne bacterial communities was lower indoors than outdoors, and mechanically ventilated rooms contained less diverse microbial communities than did window-ventilated rooms. Bacterial communities in indoor environments contained many taxa that are absent or rare outdoors, including taxa closely related to potential human pathogens. Building attributes, specifically the source of ventilation air, airflow rates, relative humidity and temperature, were correlated with the diversity and composition of indoor bacterial communities. The relative abundance of bacteria closely related to human pathogens was higher indoors than outdoors, and higher in rooms with lower airflow rates and lower relative humidity. The observed relationship between building design and airborne bacterial diversity suggests that we can manage indoor environments, altering through building design and operation the community of microbial species that potentially colonize the human microbiome during our time indoors.
Indexed as
Identifiers
What OpenQuestion holds
Registered trials
Read under generation 80e0d062 · epoch 390. Bibliography from PubMed, PubMed Central and OpenAlex; grants from NIH RePORTER; trial links from ClinicalTrials.gov; estimates, votes and beliefs from the OpenQuestion graph.