Describing the persistence landscape for introducing microbes into complex communities

Introducing non-native organisms into natural or designed microbial communities holds enormous potential but faces challenges in establishment, persistence, and containment. We propose the “persistence landscape”—the functional composition of a target microbiome that promotes or discourages engineered organism persistence. Building on existing ecological concepts, this framework predicts the fitness of introduced organisms. Application of this concept would enable controlled introduction of desired taxa and phenotypes, addressing pressing challenges in agronomy, biomanufacturing, and human health.