News Release
The Microsetta Initiative and regional projects launch a new brand identity
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Coinciding with the upcoming expansion in new countries, and the increasing variety of sample types being analyzed by The Microsetta Initiative (TMI), we began a transformation effort for the brand family to refresh our image and allow for scalability to future projects.
TMI consolidates ongoing global efforts at University of California San Diego to collect microbiome samples of the world's populations and to couple these collections with educational outreach about microbiome science. The data are de-identified and placed into the public domain to aid researchers all over the world in understanding what microbiome associations translate among populations. TMI is the parent organization of regional projects including the American Gut Project (established 2012) and the British Gut Project (established 2014).
Elements of the brand change include:
- Logo: The logos on all levels have been updated to be translatable to communities around the world, demonstrating their goal to collect data on all sorts of microscopic organisms across the globe. The colors chosen embrace a throwback to the original logo design with an influence from those of the University of California San Diego, where TMI is based.
- Website: With the need for a central access point for the regional projects and THDMI (The Human Diets & Microbiome Initiative), a collaboration with Danone Nutricia Research, a new microsite will launch on Thursday, June 27, 2019 corresponding with World Microbiome Day. The site will expand in the months to come and serve as a hub where students, citizen scientists, and supporters of the project can learn about the microbiome and how to get involved.
- Kit Redesign: As the brand evolves, so does the look and feel of the kit. Over the upcoming months participants will begin to see a new box and setup reflective of this overall brand change.
With this new brand identity, The Microsetta Initiative seeks to engage more diverse populations and sample types while improving the communication of our overall mission.
Visit the new microsite at microsetta.ucsd.edu.
About The Microsetta Initiative
The Microsetta Initiative (TMI) is an academic research project that seeks to collect microbiome samples and rich phenotypic data from across the globe, and to generate high quality technically consistent data for anyone to reuse, in order to increase the pace of microbiome research. In this pursuit, they seek to democratize the process by empowering “citizen-science” and strengthening educational outreach. Today, consisting of The American Gut Project and the British Gut Project, the initiative will someday span every continent.
About The American Gut Project
The American Gut Project (part of the Microsetta Initiative) is an active research effort in which researchers aim to work with citizen scientists to understand the life associated with humans and advance our current understanding of microbiome science. One of the big questions the American Gut scientists hope to characterize is the extent of microbial diversity associated with humans (healthy and sick, young, and old). We are in the early stages of this quest, and given the variation observed in the population, we still need to collect tens of thousands of additional samples.
About The British Gut Project
The British Gut Project (part of The Microsetta Initiative) is an open source crowd funded project run by The Department of Twin Research & Genetic Epidemiology at King’s College London in conjunction with The American Gut Project. The aim is to uncover the microbial content within the guts of British individuals. This data will help us understand what lifestyle choices relate to the microbiome and whether these observations are replicated within the independent American Gut population. Like the American Gut, this study will produce a large-scale collection of anonymized human samples and lifestyle information for researchers, and provides each participant with an educational snapshot of their microbial sample.
Media Contacts
Erin Bateman
Center for Microbiome Innovation
858-408-6610
ebateman@eng.ucsd.edu