Dr Jack A Gilbert earned his Ph.D. from Unilever and Nottingham University, UK in 2002, and received his postdoctoral training at Queens University, Canada. He subsequently returned to the UK in 2005 to Plymouth Marine Laboratory at a senior scientist until his move to Argonne National Laboratory and the University of Chicago in 2010. Dr Gilbert is Group Leader for Microbial Ecology at Argonne National Laboratory, Associate Professor in the Department of Ecology and Evolution and the Department of Surgery at University of Chicago, Associate Director of the Institute of Genomic and Systems Biology, and Senior Scientist at the Marine Biological Laboratory. Dr. Gilbert uses molecular analysis and sequencing tools to test fundamental hypotheses in ARgone National Labmicrobial ecology. He has authored more than 160 peer reviewed publications and book chapters on metagenomics and approaches to ecosystem ecology (www.gilbertlab.com). He is currently working on generating observational and mechanistic models of microbial communities in natural, urban, built and human ecosystems. He is on the board of the Genomic Standards Consortium is a section editor for PLoS ONE and senior editor for the ISME Journal and Environmental Microbiology. Among other projects, he leads the Earth Microbiome Project Home Microbiome Project Hospital Microbiome Project and co-founded American Gut. In 2014 he was recognized on Crainâ??s Buisness Chicagoâ??s 40 Under 40 List. Dr. Gilbert was mentioned in a few interviews recently when we got into discussions on the microbiome of the built environment. He is a prolific researcher and speaker we are thrilled to have been able to schedule him this week.