Exploring Linkages between Taxonomic and Functional Profiles of the Human Microbiome

Microbiome studies typically focus on characterizing the taxonomic and functional profiles of the microbes within a community. Functional profiling is generally thought to be superior to taxonomic profiling for investigating human-microbe interactions, but there are several limitations and challenge...

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Bibliographic Details
Published in:mSystems 2018-03, Vol.3 (2)
Main Author: Langille, Morgan G I
Format: Article
Language:English
Subjects:
16S
Accuracy
Artificial intelligence
Classification
Datasets
Disease
function
Genes
Genomes
Genomics
human microbiome
Hypotheses
Metabolites
metagenomics
Microbiomes
Special Issue
Taxonomy
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Summary:Microbiome studies typically focus on characterizing the taxonomic and functional profiles of the microbes within a community. Functional profiling is generally thought to be superior to taxonomic profiling for investigating human-microbe interactions, but there are several limitations and challenges to existing approaches. This Perspective discusses the current sequencing and bioinformatic methods for producing taxonomic and functional profiles, recent studies utilizing and comparing these technologies, and the existing challenges and limitations of these data. In addition, functional versus taxonomic conservation across the population is questioned, while future research that focuses on investigating the taxonomic diversity of microbial functions is proposed.
ISSN:2379-5077
2379-5077
DOI:10.1128/mSystems.00163-17