About the Workshop
This one-day workshop will bring together researchers and practitioners to explore the emerging science of indoor microbiomes and what it means for healthy building design. At a time when indoor health conversations often focus on pollutants, comfort or infection prevention alone, this event highlights the microbial dimension of buildings as a vital and still underdeveloped frontier.
Buildings are not sterile enclosures. They are living indoor ecosystems shaped by ventilation systems, materials, occupancy patterns, cleaning practices and environmental conditions. Understanding those interactions opens new questions for health, sustainability and resilience.
We warmly welcome early career researchers and invite poster abstract submissions from ECRs working in engineering, architecture, environmental sciences, public health, microbiology, data science and related fields.
Themes We Will Explore
The workshop is designed to spark cross-disciplinary conversation around the science, design and governance of healthier indoor microbial environments.
Building systems
How ventilation, filtration, layout and building operation influence indoor microbial communities.
Healthy microbial environments
What defines a beneficial indoor microbial ecology and how it relates to human wellbeing.
Trade-offs and tensions
Where infection prevention, sustainability, cleaning and microbial ecology may align or conflict.
Data and collaboration
The measurements, datasets and interdisciplinary methods needed to advance this field.
Call for Poster Abstracts
For Early Career Researchers
We cordially invite poster abstract submissions on topics related to indoor microbiomes, healthy buildings and adjacent areas of inquiry.
How to submit
Please send your abstract by email to one of the workshop organisers. This page uses placeholder email addresses exactly as provided — replace them with the final addresses before publishing.
Suggested poster topics
Indoor microbial ecology, ventilation and indoor health, healthy building design, microbial monitoring, infection prevention interfaces, sustainability trade-offs, building operation, environmental microbiology, sensing, modelling and data-driven approaches.
Why Attend?
Gain fresh perspectives
Explore microbiomes as a missing layer in healthy building research and discover emerging questions across disciplines.
Build collaborations
Meet researchers and practitioners working across engineering, public health, architecture and microbial sciences.
Share your work
Poster presentations offer ECRs a supportive forum to showcase work and test new interdisciplinary ideas.
Shape the field
Help define the evidence, data and methods needed to advance microbiome-aware healthy building practice.
Venue & Event Information
📍Venue
Nexus Building
University of Leeds
Leeds LS2 9JT
United Kingdom
🕘Timing
Tuesday 19 May 2026
09:30 – 16:00
🎫Registration
Attendance is free. Please register using the event form once the final URL is inserted.
Go to registration →Acknowledgement
Supported by the Healthy Buildings Network
We gratefully acknowledge the Healthy Buildings Network for supporting this initiative and enabling interdisciplinary collaboration through ECR funding.
Contact the Organisers
For registration or poster enquiries, please contact:
Dr Suparna Mitra
s.mitra@leeds.ac.ukDr Hema Viswambharan
h.viswambharan@leeds.ac.ukPlease replace placeholder email addresses before publishing.
Join the conversation on indoor health
Help rethink the future of healthy buildings by bringing the microbial dimension into dialogue with design, operation, public health and sustainability.