Building better microbial infection models: a call to do the "field" experiments.

Benchmarking microbial behavior in natural environments is essential to validate and improve experimental infection models.

• Why it matters: Without clear benchmarks, models are often labeled "biologically relevant" without evidence that they accurately reflect real microbial environments, limiting their usefulness.
• What they did: The author advocates for conducting "field" experiments that directly measure microbial behavior and function in natural settings, despite their challenges, to establish benchmarks for model validation.
• The result: Implementing these field-based measurements will enable researchers to determine what models accurately capture, identify gaps, and enhance their ability to address real-world microbial questions.