Billionaire donates $35 million to microbiome research

A San Francisco billionaire has donated $35 million to Stanford University and the University of California, San Francisco to enhance their study of the human microbiome.

Salesforce CEO Marc Benioff and his wife Lynne Benioff donated $25 million to launch the UCSF Benioff Center for Microbiome Medicine and $10 million to the Stanford Microbiome Therapies Initiative.

The human microbiome is the full assortment of bacteria, viruses, and other microbes than inhabits the human body.

The donation announced Tuesday will help the universities’ efforts to develop new ways to predict, prevent and treat dermatological, gastrointestinal, respiratory and neurological disorders linked to microbiome dysfunction.

The two Bay Area Benioff-funded initiatives will also work together to further a joint goal of advancing innovative microbiome-based therapies.