Symbiotic Synergies

- How The Body Became A Chimera (1950-2020)

The human body is an enormous microbial community - the microbiome - that needs to be kept in a healthy balance. Humans could therefore each be referred to as an eco-system. Using the analogy of the body being like a geographical area, this two-dimensional female figure is brought to life by drawing her landscape similar to the contour lines found on a map. Upon this terrain are the charted areas of the trillions of microbes represented as hand embroidered French knots. The colours represent the major groups of microbes present on the skin, and give a sense of the diversity, proportions and distributions of the communities that make our bodies their home. The bright, seductive and tactile surface is embellished rather than blemished so that it focuses on the positive aspects of the human microbiome. The fetus is microbe free and quietly awaits it journey into the world for its first seeding of microbes. This embroidered work was created using data from the Professor Michael Wilson at the Department of Microbiology at University College London. This data helps to represent the many different types of microbes that inhabit the surface of the skin and how they colonise certain areas of the body. Symbiosis was commissioned by the Eden Project, supported by the Wellcome Trust and Arts Council England.

Symbiosis, embroidery on fabric. 2015. Rebecca D Harris. Source: Wellcome Collection.

Over the past two decades, the microbiome paradigm has revolutionised the life sciences. Its central concept – that the body together with its native symbiotic microbes constitute a single organism, like a lichen or coral – is transforming how health and human bodies are understood (Berg et al. 2020). But scientific leaders in the field complain of conceptual confusion hindering progress.

Supported by an Australian Research Council Discovery Award (2026-2029), the interdisciplinary Symbiotic Synergies project aims to break through the confusion. Led by Prof Maureen O'Malley (University of Sydney), Prof Nicholas Rasmussen (University of New South Wales), and Assoc Prof Claas Kirchhelle (CERMES3, Paris), it will be the first comprehensive historical and philosophical study of microbiome science. Symbiotic Synergies will probe the field’s rationales and their origins in order to offer vital insights to scientists and advance knowledge in the history and philosophy of science.

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