Microbial Dark Matter and Metagenomics

Abstract :

Bacteria and Archaea are the oldest, most abundant, and particularly most diverse forms of life. They dominate many functions of the biosphere and harbour a huge potential for sustainable biotechnological applications. The task of fully characterizing microbial diversity is incomprehensibly vast. The ‘known unknowns’ have become increasingly apparent in the recent years, while the number of “unknown unknowns” is still heavily debated: some studies suggesting millions, some billions or even trillions of prokaryotic species on Earth. For the majority, only phylogenetic marker genes are known and no cultured representatives exist. At this point it is therefore safe to say that over 99% of all microbial species from the environment remain uncharacterized. They are therefore referred to as Microbial Dark Matter (MDM). At IBG-5 we aim to elucidate MDM using cultivation-independent omics approaches, especially single cell omics, as well as midi-metagenomics. We have established one of three high-throughput pipelines worldwide, allowing us to target specific microorganisms and investigating minimal genome requirements and syntrophic interactions as well as probing horizontal gene transfer and metabolic potential.

Please find the zoom link below:

https://inrae-fr.zoom.us/j/5785660130?omn=94458590196