Figure 2: The human gut microbiome is highly personalized and very stable.

a, The taxonomic profile of the human gut microbiome varies a lot across different individuals. Here the stacked bar chart demonstrates the phylum-level gut microbial compositions of ~200 healthy adults in the HMP cohort¹. b, The taxonomic profile of the human gut microbiome is highly dynamic but very stable. In the absence of drastic interventions, the human gut microbiome can be considered as a dynamically stable ecosystem, continually buffeted by internal and external forces and recovering back toward a conserved steady-state³⁸. Here the stacked bar chart demonstrates the daily phylum-level gut microbial compositions of a healthy adult over ~200 days in the Moving Picture study³⁹. Figure courtesy of Dr. Xu-Wen Wang.