Early development of the skin microbiome and association to atopic dermatitis

Atopic dermatitis (AD) is the most common chronic noncommunicable disease, with at least 230 million people suffering worldwide. Because AD often begins in the first years of life, the temporal and thereby causal relationship between the skin microbiome must be studied before the actual disease onset. Here we have carried out longitudinal 16S amplicon sequencing of skin swabs for determining skin bacterial composition in 800 children. The V3-V4 region of the 16S rRNA gene skin microbiome data generated are from two longitudinal deeply phenotyped birth cohorts Enquiring About Tolerance (EAT) and Copenhagen Prospective Studies on Asthma in Childhood 2010 (COPSAC 2010). Both the volar forearm and elbow were sampled in EAT at age 3 and 12 months. In COPSAC2010 the volar forearm were sampled between 1 to 3 years of age and again when they were 3 years. The data uploaded represents skin microbiomes from more than 800 children sampled at multiple timepoints and different sample sites.