Foregut microbiome in development of esophageal adenocarcinoma Metagenome

Esophageal adenocarcinoma, the type of cancer linked to heartburn due to gastroesophageal reflux diseases (GERD), has jumped six fold in the past 30 years, which cannot be explained by the usual environmental or host factors. We intend to characterize the change in the esophageal microbiome (the native bacterial population of the esophagus), in patients at various stages in GERD. If GERD represents a microbiome-related disease, it could be possible to design new antibiotic or probiotic treatment strategies to prevent GERD and reverse the current trend of increasing rate of esophageal adenocarcinoma.