The microbiota vault initiative: safeguarding Earth's microbial heritage for future generations

Abstract

Microbial ecosystems are fundamental to planetary and human health, yet human activities are accelerating their loss. Disruptions to microbial communities undermine environmental stability, biodiversity, and health. Urgent action is required to preserve microbial diversity. The Microbiota Vault Initiative provides a global framework to safeguard microbiomes from human, animal, and environmental sources. It proactively archives microbial diversity for future needs, prioritizing depositor sovereignty, equitable collaboration, and ethical governance. By sharing limited information on deposits, the initiative fosters microbial conservation and collaboration between local and global researchers. It complements other efforts to ensure the resilience of microbiomes in an era of rapid environmental change.

Fig. 1. Conceptual framework of the microbiota vault.

The Microbiota Vault educates scientists and promotes the creation of Local Collections for preservation and research. These local collections can request that the Microbiota Vault preserve a safe backup of their specimens, maintaining all rights over their deposits; they have the option to request sequencing for open access under the license of their choice, and the MV will publish on its webpage a database of the deposited specimens, including metadata, links to sequences, and contact information about depositors. Those in the global community interested in doing research can then contact the depositor from the Local Working Collection. For the use of data derived from the Microbiota Vault, explicit acknowledgments to the specific Local Working Collection and to the Microbiota Vault will be required.