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New publication:TbasCO: trait-based comparative ‘omics identifies ecosystem-level and niche-differentiating adaptations of an engineered microbiome
In recent times, the importance of understanding microbial communities is becoming increasingly more clear. Wether it is in health related fields, agriculture, or many other, we need to know the composition of a community, in order to know what is happening in the system.
In the past, many studies have focussed on the presence of species and specific marker genes. However, marker genes are not linked to traits with complete fidelity, nor do they capture important attributes, such as the timing of gene expression or coordination among traits. To address this, we present an approach for assessing the trait landscape of microbial communities by statistically defining a trait attribute as a shared transcriptional pattern across multiple organisms. This novel framework allows us to unrevel the functional dynamics of uncultivated microorganisms through genome-resolved time-series metatranscriptomics.