No. First of all we don’t know which microbes and in which quantities we want. We have more or less no clue what constitutes a good microbiome. Bacteriophages also seem to play an important role that we know even less about. That’s the beauty of FMT—we don’t need to know!
Second, most microbes in the gut are anaerobic and thus cannot be grown easily. There is not a single anaerobic probiotic available at this point. That’s why probiotics don’t come even close to replacing something like FMT, which is done suh that bacteriophages and anaerobic microbes survive.
The problem of “growing artificial poop in the lab” for e.g. FMT pills, is similarly difficult/impossible at this point like growing ordinary “dirt”.
Is it possible to grow the microbes in a lab, after obtaining them? Then you would not need so many donors.
No. First of all we don’t know which microbes and in which quantities we want. We have more or less no clue what constitutes a good microbiome. Bacteriophages also seem to play an important role that we know even less about. That’s the beauty of FMT—we don’t need to know!
Second, most microbes in the gut are anaerobic and thus cannot be grown easily. There is not a single anaerobic probiotic available at this point. That’s why probiotics don’t come even close to replacing something like FMT, which is done suh that bacteriophages and anaerobic microbes survive.
The problem of “growing artificial poop in the lab” for e.g. FMT pills, is similarly difficult/impossible at this point like growing ordinary “dirt”.