Michael Scott Robeson, PhD, MS

Research Program: Cancer Therapeutics Faculty Rank: Assistant Professor Campus: University of Arkansas for Medical Sciences College: College of Medicine Department: Biomedical Informatics

Cancer Research Interest

• Disease Site Focus: Thoracic/ Lung, Multiple Myeloma, Head and Neck, Gynecology, GI, Breast, Cutaneous/Melanoma
• Research Focus Area: Informatics, Prevention, Treatment
• Type of Research: Basic, Clinical
• Research Keywords: Microbiome, Metagenomics, Microbiome Data Science, Microbiomics, Molecular Biology, Microbial Ecology, Phylogenetics, Phylogenomics
• Research Interest Statement: I am a microbiome scientist that have been continually involved in the development of microbiome data science and bioinformatics tools such as QIIME 2, PyCogent, PanFP, and RESCRIPt along with continuing code contributions to existing open-source microbiome data science tools. I have also served as a microbiome science and bioinformatics consultant for several academic, national, and private-sector research laboratories. There has been ever-increasing interest in how the microbiome can affect the progression, and therapeutic treatment of cancer. Over the last several years there have been numerous publications that investigated the relationship of microbiota and a variety of cancers such as colon, lung, pancreatic, ovarian, and many more. In fact, the cancer microbiome is of great interest to the National Cancer Institute (NCI), which has specifically called out “Investigating the Role of Microbiomes in Cancer” in their 2020 Annual Plan & Budget Proposal and was further outlined in their “Bugs as Cancer Drugs” commentary which was subsequently followed by the announcement of two NIH-NCI RFAs. In this vein, I am currently collaborating with the following UAMS researcher’s various cancer-related projects: I am working with 1) Dr. Ruud Dings to characterize the responses of the gut microbiome to antibiotic-induced perturbation and their association to the tumor microenvironment; 2) Dr. Mayumi Nakagawa on elucidating the relationships and responses of the cervicovaginal, oral, and gut microbial communities to the presence of human papillomaviruses; 3) Dr. Antiño Allen on associations of the microbiome to chemotherapeutic treatments and murine behavior.

Contact Information

• Email Address: MROBESON@UAMS.EDU
• Profiles Research Networking Software: View Profile

Active Grants

• NIH/Nat. Cancer Institute – 1R01CA245083
  “Improvement of cellular immunotherapy during dysbiosis”
  Co-Investigator
  9/15/2021 – 8/31/2026
• NIH/Nat. Cancer Institute – 2R01CA143130
  “Understanding and Enhancing T-Cell Responses to High Risk Human Papillomaviruses-Renewal”
  Co-Investigator
  7/1/2021 – 6/30/2026

Recent Publications

• Bokulich NA, Robeson MS 2nd. Bioinformatics challenges for profiling the microbiome in cancer: pitfalls and opportunities. Trends in microbiology. 2024. PMID: 39271424.
• Piccolo BD, Graham JL, Tabor-Simecka L, [et al., including Robeson MS]. Colonic epithelial hypoxia remains constant during the progression of diabetes in male UC Davis type 2 diabetes mellitus rats. BMJ open diabetes research & care. 2024 12(2). PMID: 38453236. PMCID: PMC10921531.
• Azhar G, Verma A, Robeson MS, [et al.]. Short-Term Ingestion of Essential Amino Acid Based Nutritional Supplements or Whey Protein Improves the Physical Function of Older Adults Independently of Gut Microbiome. Molecular nutrition & food research. 2024:e2300716. PMID: 38426663.
• Corley C, McElroy T, Sridharan B, [et al., including Robeson MS 2nd]. Physiological and cognitive changes after treatments of cyclophosphamide, methotrexate, and fluorouracil: implications of the gut microbiome and depressive-like behavior. Frontiers in neuroscience. 2023 17:1212791. PMID: 37869506. PMCID: PMC10587567.
• Miller JC, Satheesh Babu AK, Petersen C, [et al., including Robeson MS 2nd]. Gut Microbes Are Associated with the Vascular Beneficial Effects of Dietary Strawberry on Metabolic Syndrome-Induced Vascular Inflammation. Molecular nutrition & food research. 2022 66(22):e2200112. PMID: 36112603. PMCID: PMC9691581.
• DuBose JG, Robeson MS, Hoogshagen M, [et al.]. Complexities of Inferring Symbiont Function: Paraburkholderia Symbiont Dynamics in Social Amoeba Populations and Their Impacts on the Amoeba Microbiota. Applied and environmental microbiology. 2022 88(18):e0128522. PMID: 36043858. PMCID: PMC9499018.
• Ippolito JR, Piccolo BD, Robeson MS, [et al.]. Iron deficient diets modify the gut microbiome and reduce the severity of enteric infection in a mouse model of S. Typhimurium-induced enterocolitis. The Journal of nutritional biochemistry. 2022 107:109065. PMID: 35609848.
• Robeson MS 2nd, Manna K, Randolph C, [et al.]. Short-Term Metformin Treatment Enriches Bacteroides dorei in an Obese Liver Steatosis Zucker Rat Model. Frontiers in microbiology. 2022 13:834776. PMID: 35432282. PMCID: PMC9006818.
• Elolimy A, Rosa F, Tripp P, [et al., including Robeson MS]. Bacterial and Fungal Adaptations in Cecum and Distal Colon of Piglets Fed With Dairy-Based Milk Formula in Comparison With Human Milk. Frontiers in microbiology. 2022 13:801854. PMID: 35401465. PMCID: PMC8989072.
• Robeson MS 2nd, O'Rourke DR, Kaehler BD, [et al.]. RESCRIPt: Reproducible sequence taxonomy reference database management. PLoS computational biology. 2021 17(11):e1009581. PMID: 34748542. PMCID: PMC8601625.
• Piccolo BD, Graham JL, Kang P, [et al., including Robeson MS]. Progression of diabetes is associated with changes in the ileal transcriptome and ileal-colon morphology in the UC Davis Type 2 Diabetes Mellitus rat. Physiological reports. 2021 9(22):e15102. PMID: 34806320. PMCID: PMC8606862.
• Carper DL, Weston DJ, Barde A, [et al., including Robeson MS 2nd]. Cultivating the Bacterial Microbiota of Populus Roots. mSystems. 2021 6(3):e0130620. PMID: 34156297. PMCID: PMC8269261.
• Dillon MR, Bolyen E, Adamov A, [et al., including Robeson M]. Experiences and lessons learned from two virtual, hands-on microbiome bioinformatics workshops. PLoS computational biology. 2021 17(6):e1009056. PMID: 34166363. PMCID: PMC8224931.
• Abram K, Udaondo Z, Bleker C, [et al., including Robeson MS 2nd]. Mash-based analyses of Escherichia coli genomes reveal 14 distinct phylogroups. Communications biology. 2021 4(1):117. PMID: 33500552. PMCID: PMC7838162.
• Sallinger E, Robeson MS, Haselkorn TS. Characterization of the bacterial microbiomes of social amoebae and exploration of the roles of host and environment on microbiome composition. Environmental microbiology. 2021 23(1):126-142. PMID: 33063404.
• Shibata T, Nakagawa M, Coleman HN, [et al., including Robeson MS 2nd]. Evaluation of DNA extraction protocols from liquid-based cytology specimens for studying cervical microbiota. PloS one. 2021 16(8):e0237556. PMID: 34460815. PMCID: PMC8404996.
• Graw S, Tackett A, Chappell K, [et al., including Robeson MS 2nd]. Multi-omics data integration considerations and study design for biological systems and disease. Molecular omics. 2020. PMID: 33347526. PMCID: PMC8058243.
• Kandel S, Sripiboon S, Jenjaroenpun P, [et al., including Robeson MS 2nd]. 16S rRNA Gene Amplicon Profiling of Baby and Adult Captive Elephants in Thailand. Microbiology resource announcements. 2020 9(24). PMID: 32527771. PMCID: PMC7291096.
• Darcy JL, Washburne AD, Robeson MS, [et al.]. A phylogenetic model for the recruitment of species into microbial communities and application to studies of the human microbiome. The ISME journal. 2020 14(6):1359-1368. PMID: 32076128. PMCID: PMC7242462.
• Smyser TJ, Tabak MA, Slootmaker C, [et al., including Robeson MS 2nd]. Mixed ancestry from wild and domestic lineages contributes to the rapid expansion of invasive feral swine. Molecular ecology. 2020 29(6):1103-1119. PMID: 32080922.
• Wassenaar TM, Jun SR, Robeson M, Ussery DW. Comparative genomics of hepatitis A virus, hepatitis C virus, and hepatitis E virus provides insights into the evolutionary history of Hepatovirus species. MicrobiologyOpen. 2020 9(2):e973. PMID: 31742930. PMCID: PMC7002107.
• Bokulich NA, Ziemski M, Robeson MS 2nd, Kaehler BD. Measuring the microbiome: Best practices for developing and benchmarking microbiomics methods. Computational and structural biotechnology journal. 2020 18:4048-4062. PMID: 33363701. PMCID: PMC7744638.
• Jenkins SV, Robeson MS 2nd, Griffin RJ, [et al.]. Gastrointestinal Tract Dysbiosis Enhances Distal Tumor Progression through Suppression of Leukocyte Trafficking. Cancer research. 2019 79(23):5999-6009. PMID: 31591154. PMCID: PMC6891208.