过去认为健康人肺部是无菌的，对疾病状态下呼吸道菌群的研究依赖传统培养技术。近年来， DNA测序技术应用于呼吸道标本的微生物检测，发现健康肺部存在复杂的微生物群。越来越多的证据表明，呼吸道微生物群在多种慢性呼吸道疾病发生和发展过程中扮演重要角色，与哮喘、慢性阻塞性肺病等疾病的临床表现、急性加重及预后相关。通过比较急性加重期与稳定期患者的呼吸道标本微生物群，形成了新的疾病假说，阐释了慢性呼吸道疾病急性加重的微生物学基础。未来对微生物测序数据的深度挖掘及基于临床问题的研究，有望为慢性呼吸道疾病的治疗提供新的靶点。

The lungs of healthy individuals are previously considered to be sterile. However, modern microbiological techniques using DNA sequencing reveal the existence of a complex and dynamic microbiome in the normal respiratory tract. There is growing evidence that the respiratory microbiome has an important effect on the development and progression of chronic respiratory diseases and the features of respiratory microbe are associated with clinical phenotypes and prognosis. Comparison of respiratory samples of patients between stable and exacerbation phases leads to new hypothesis for exacerbation of these diseases. Future studies of lung microbe, with progresses in sequencing data analysis and study design focused on clinical problems, will provide a potential therapeutic target for chronic respiratory diseases.