About the Authors

Les Dethlefsen

Affiliations Department of Microbiology and Immunology, Stanford University, Stanford, California, United States of America , Department of Medicine, Stanford University, Stanford, California, United States of America

Sue Huse

Affiliation Josephine Bay Paul Center for Comparative Molecular Biology and Evolution, Marine Biological Laboratory, Woods Hole, Massachusetts, United States of America

Mitchell L Sogin

Affiliation Josephine Bay Paul Center for Comparative Molecular Biology and Evolution, Marine Biological Laboratory, Woods Hole, Massachusetts, United States of America

David A Relman

To whom correspondence should be addressed. E-mail: relman@stanford.edu

Affiliations Department of Microbiology and Immunology, Stanford University, Stanford, California, United States of America , Department of Medicine, Stanford University, Stanford, California, United States of America , Veterans Affairs Palo Alto Health Care System, Palo Alto, California, United States of America

Competing Interests

The authors have declared that no competing interests exist.

Author Contributions

LD, MLS, and DAR conceived and designed the experiments. LD performed the experiments. LD, SMH, MLS, and DAR analyzed the data. LD, SMH, MLS, and DAR contributed reagents/materials/analysis tools. LD and DAR wrote the paper.