Professor Tim Spector Wins Award for Gut Bacteria Research

by Paz Garcia

Professor Tim Spector has been awarded the 2019 DuPont Nutrition & Biosciences Microbiome Science Award, in recognition for his leadership and pioneering work in the microbiome field. 

Professor Spector is Director of TwinsUK, which he founded in 1992. Over 14,000 twins take part in TwinsUK, which is the richest collection of health research information on a cohort worldwide. 

Professor Spector’s research in recent years has focused on the microbiome – the millions of bacteria that live in our gut – and its relationship with health. This has led to the world’s largest personalised nutrition study of its kind, called PREDICT. 

Speaking ahead of the award ceremony in Denmark, Professor Spector paid tribute to all the twins who take part in TwinsUK: 

 “We now have a better understanding of how the microbiome is intimately linked with our health. I am excited to continue working in this field as we unravel the relationships between our genetics, the food that we eat, the bacteria in our guts and our health. 

“I would like to take this opportunity to say thank you to everyone involved in TwinsUK, and in particular the twins. After all, our twins were giving up stool samples for microbiome science long before it became mainstream.”