Educational information
WikiBiome is an educational reference, not a medical service. Its content does not provide diagnosis, treatment, individualized risk assessment, or a substitute for advice from a qualified healthcare professional. Scientific evidence changes, and pages may contain open questions or source-registry warnings.
Accuracy and evidence
WikiBiome works to preserve citations, provenance, uncertainty, and revision history, but it does not warrant that every page is complete, current, or error-free. Readers should inspect the cited research and use professional judgment before relying on scientific or health information.
Contributions
You may propose corrections, new evidence, clarifications, accessibility changes, and link repairs through the moderated contribution workflow. By submitting material, you confirm that you have the right to provide it and grant WikiBiome permission to review, edit, attribute, preserve, and publish accepted text as part of the knowledge base. Submission does not guarantee acceptance.
Researcher claims and author context
A source claim verifies that an authenticated researcher is an author of the identified work. Claims are non-exclusive, do not prove copyright ownership, do not transfer editorial control, and do not imply that an author endorses WikiBiome’s synthesis. Author context is moderated, attributed, and presented alongside—not in place of—the independent editorial record.
Research submissions and manuscripts
Research intake accepts persistent identifiers and may accept an optional private PDF for editorial ingestion. You must not upload a publisher version or other file unless you are authorized to provide it. By checking the rights attestation, you confirm that the upload is an author manuscript or openly licensed version you may provide. Acceptance creates an editorial change packet and never bypasses repository review or guarantees publication, citation, visibility, or Keystone status.
Research discussions
Public discussion is for collegial scientific questions, interpretation, methods, new evidence, and corrections. Do not provide patient-specific advice; disclose personal health information; impersonate another person; commercially promote a product or service; coerce citations; or assert unsupported treatments. Scientific assertions should identify a DOI, PMID, or other checkable source. Posts may be premoderated, revised with immutable history, reported, hidden, locked, or removed from public view.
Research proposals
Researcher proposals must be anchored in microbiome science, metallomics, or both, and include checkable sources, a mechanistic connection, causal limits, and conflicts. Only accepted proposals are publicly attributed. Acceptance creates an editorial change packet and does not bypass repository review, guarantee publication, or transfer editorial control.
Private messaging
Researchers may request contact and exchange messages only after the recipient accepts. Do not use messaging for harassment, patient-specific advice, personal health information, commercial promotion, citation coercion, impersonation, or unsupported treatment claims. Messages have no attachments and are not end-to-end encrypted. Reported conversations may be reviewed by moderators, and either participant may block the other.
Contribution recognition
One star marks a first accepted scientific contribution. Two stars require three accepted contributions across at least two records. Three stars require five accepted contributions spanning at least two contribution types. Four stars require moderator confirmation of a microbiome- or metallomics-anchored cross-omics bridge. Five stars require human-reviewed Topic Steward status based on sustained quality and conduct.
Verified claims alone, pending or rejected work, duplicates, self-promotion, removed activity, and payment do not count. There is no leaderboard. Recognition may be corrected or revoked with an audit reason; appeals may be sent to researchers@wikibiome.com.
Research conferences and Microbiome Roundtables
The Events and Roundtable page is an interest and early-invitation registry, not registration for a scheduled event. Four- and five-star researchers who separately opt in may enter a private shortlist for relevant conferences, symposia, workshops, and Roundtables. Final invitations remain human decisions based on subject fit, contribution quality, conflicts, conduct, and interdisciplinary representation. No star, payment, registry entry, or shortlist placement guarantees an invitation.
Institutions
Institution profiles use ROR identity and reviewed administration. An institution may manage batches and invite researchers, but it may not claim individual authorship, guarantee citation, purchase placement, or direct WikiBiome’s independent editorial decisions.
Licensing and third-party material
Unless a page states otherwise, original WikiBiome text and in-house scientific reconstructions are made available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 license. Research papers, quotations, third-party images, trademarks, and other third-party materials remain subject to their own rights and licenses. A citation does not transfer ownership of the cited work.
Support and editorial independence
Support payments are processed by Stripe for Microbiome Signatures LLC, the parent company of WikiBiome and Microbiome Medicine. Payments are not described as tax-deductible. Financial support cannot purchase citations, inclusion, favorable treatment, a Keystone designation, or visibility.
Acceptable use
Do not misuse the site, interfere with its operation, evade access controls, automate abusive requests, impersonate another person, submit unlawful material, or use the contribution system to promote unsupported medical claims, products, or services.
Project responsibility
WikiBiome is a project of Microbiome Medicine. Payment processing and business administration are conducted through Microbiome Signatures LLC. To report a legal, copyright, or attribution concern, use the contact page.
Changes
These terms may be updated as the project, participation system, or legal requirements change. The effective date above identifies the current published version. The Privacy page explains how implemented features handle personal information.