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His lab may be only a year old, but research into the human gut microbiome has landed a University of Calgary researcher a position with an international scholars network.

, PhD, an assistant professor in the and Tier II Canada Research Chair in Molecular Genetics for Microbiome Editing, joined the 2026-2028 cohort of the program in April 1.

Bakkeren’s research will focus on the gut microbiome, and how it can be engineered to correct health outcomes.

The CIFAR Global Scholars Program gives early career researchers the opportunity to develop and lead high-risk, high-reward interdisciplinary work. Scholars receive two years of funding for their projects.

Bakkeren, who started his lab in 2025, is believed to be the second UCalgary scientist to receive the award after , PhD, in 2024.  

“There’s thousands of species of microbes that colonize our bodies, and I’m interested in how they interact with each other and how we can use these interactions to our advantage,” says Bakkeren.

The human gut microbiome is incredibly important, he explains, as our microbes assist in digestion and are known to help train and boost the immune system.

It’s also one of a kind. The gut microbiome is unique for each person, and its composition changes throughout the course of an individual’s life, which presents a challenge when it comes to health care.

“You can’t just apply one solution to everyone; it needs to be individualized,” Bakkeren says.

“First, we need to understand how turnover in a microbiome occurs, so that we can predict what happens if we were to introduce something new to our own microbiome.”

The process requires Bakkeren’s research group to build artificial communities using different combinations of human gut microbes. The technique they use allows for quick screening of multiple communities at a time, speeding up the identification of interesting cases.

“The goal of this part of the project is to get into the details of which species are important, and how they contribute,” he explains, noting that microbes behave differently when they are in an environment alone and in competition against other species.

“In another project, we’re going to pit specific microbes against each other in a competitive environment and see whose survival strategies and adaptations allow them to thrive,” Bakkeren says, describing this part of the work as a “bacterial fight club.”

It might sound silly, he admits, but that portion of the study will help researchers combat harmful types of bacteria that pose threats to human health by introducing or manipulating bacteria themselves instead of using conventional antibiotics.

“When we think about how microbes are successful, we can repurpose that information for therapeutic use down the road,” Bakkeren says.