Addressing global ruminant agricultural challenges through understanding the rumen microbiome::Past, present and future

The rumen is a complex ecosystem composed of anaerobic bacteria, protozoa, fungi, methanogenic archaea and phages. These microbes interact closely to breakdown plant material that cannot be digested by humans, whilst providing metabolic energy to the host and, in the case of archaea, producing methane. Consequently, ruminants produce meat and milk, which are rich in high-quality protein, vitamins and minerals, and therefore contribute to food security. As the world population is predicted to reach approximately 9.7 billion by 2050, an increase in ruminant production to satisfy global protein demand is necessary, despite limited land availability, and whilst ensuring environmental impact is minimized. Although challenging, these goals can be met, but depend on our understanding of the rumen microbiome. Attempts to manipulate the rumen microbiome to benefit global agricultural challenges have been ongoing for decades with limited success, mostly due to the lack of a detailed understanding of this microbiome and our limited ability to culture most of these microbes outside the rumen. The potential to manipulate the rumen microbiome and meet global livestock challenges through animal breeding and introduction of dietary interventions during early life have recently emerged as promising new technologies. Our inability to phenotype ruminants in a high-throughput manner has also hampered progress, although the recent increase in “omic” data may allow further development of mathematical models and rumen microbial gene biomarkers as proxies. Advances in computational tools, high-throughput sequencing technologies and cultivation-independent “omics” approaches continue to revolutionize our understanding of the rumen microbiome. This will ultimately provide the knowledge framework needed to solve current and future ruminant livestock challenges

A catalog of microbial genes from the bovine rumen unveils a specialized and diverse biomass-degrading environment

Background The rumen microbiota provides essential services to its host and, through its role in ruminant production, contributes to human nutrition and food security. A thorough knowledge of the genetic potential of rumen microbes will provide opportunities for improving the sustainability of ruminant production systems. The availability of gene reference catalogs from gut microbiomes has advanced the understanding of the role of the microbiota in health and disease in humans and other mammals. In this work, we established a catalog of reference prokaryote genes from the bovine rumen. Results Using deep metagenome sequencing we identified 13,825,880 non-redundant prokaryote genes from the bovine rumen. Compared to human, pig, and mouse gut metagenome catalogs, the rumen is larger and richer in functions and microbial species associated with the degradation of plant cell wall material and production of methane. Genes encoding enzymes catalyzing the breakdown of plant polysaccharides showed a particularly high richness that is otherwise impossible to infer from available genomes or shallow metagenomics sequencing. The catalog expands the dataset of carbohydrate-degrading enzymes described in the rumen. Using an independent dataset from a group of 77 cattle fed 4 common dietary regimes, we found that only <0.1% of genes were shared by all animals, which contrast with a large overlap for functions, i.e., 63% for KEGG functions. Different diets induced differences in the relative abundance rather than the presence or absence of genes, which explains the great adaptability of cattle to rapidly adjust to dietary changes. Conclusions These data bring new insights into functions, carbohydrate-degrading enzymes, and microbes of the rumen to complement the available information on microbial genomes. The catalog is a significant biological resource enabling deeper understanding of phenotypes and biological processes and will be expanded as new data are made available.info:eu-repo/semantics/publishedVersio

Use of microbiome data to explain the expression of productive traits in domestic species

Tesis inédita de la Universidad Complutense de Madrid, Facultad de Veterinaria, leída el 11-03-2022El descubrimiento de comunidades microbianas asociadas simbióticamente a organismos eucariotas ha llevado a un cambio de paradigma en la definición de individuo biológico, que ahora se ve como una combinación codependiente del hospedador y su microbioma, u holobionte. Por tanto, el estudio de los microbiomas se ha convertido en algo fundamental para comprender la biología de los organismos vivos complejos. De hecho, se ha observado que las comunidades microbianas poseen un papel crucial en la salud, supervivencia, desarrollo y metabolismo del hospedador. Los recientes avances en secuenciación genética han supuesto un importante impulso para la investigación en microbiología, al permitir la obtención de bases de datos de secuenciación masiva que abarcan una gran parte de la diversidad presente dentro de los microbiomas. La era del next-generation sequencing ha aportado nuevos conocimientos sobre el efecto de las comunidades microbianas sobre el fenotipo del hospedador, con especial relevancia del microbioma intestinal. Para la industria ganadera este hecho ha dado lugar a importantes avances en la comprensión de los mecanismos biológicos que influyen en productividad, sostenibilidad y bienestar animal, lo que podría ser útil para afrontar los desafíos existentes en este sector...The discovery of microbial communities symbiotically associated with eukaryotic organisms has led to a paradigm shift in the definition of the biological individual, which is now seen as a co-dependent combination of the host and its microbiome, or holobiont. Thus, the study of microbiomes has become essential to understand the biology of complex living organisms. Indeed, current research points to a crucial role of microbial communities in host health, survivability, development and metabolism. Recent advances in DNA sequencing have entailed a significant boost to microbial research, allowing the generation of massive sequencing databases encompassing a large proportion of the diversity inside microbiomes. The era of next-generation sequencing has brought new knowledge about the role of microbial communities, with special significance for gut microbiomes, in host phenotype. For livestock industry, this has led to important advances in the understanding of biological mechanisms influencing animal welfare, productivity and sustainability, which could be useful to face existing challenges in animal production...Fac. de VeterinariaTRUEunpu

Investigating the Development of Fecal Bacterial Communities in Growing Dairy Calves

The gut development of young calves is crucial for the producer and the calf\u27s future. Many factors can affect the development of a young calf\u27s gastrointestinal system, and there has been little research into the fecal microbiome development of calves from 0 to 12 weeks of age. To gain further insight into this process, development of the fecal microbiome in 12 dairy calves was investigated. Fecal bacterial composition was determined at four time points (weeks 0, 4, 8 and 12) using the 16S rRNA gene through PCR-amplification of the V1-V3 regions from fecal microbial genomic DNA, followed by Illumina MiSeq 2X300 sequencing. Four highly represented OTUs were found to have a peak of abundance at week 0 which was followed by significantly lower abundance at later time points (P \u3c 0.05). Notably, OTU Bt-1063 peaked at week 0 (39.3% ± 3.6%) then declined at later time points with respective means of 2.3%, 0.1% and 0.05%. Seven other OTUs were found to peak at an intermediate time point (P \u3c 0.05), including OTU Bt-1195 which was found in highest abundance at week 4 (4.5% ± 1.2%) compared to means with a range of 0.001% to 0.01% for the other time points. These results could allow for gut manipulation in the future which could improve the health and productivity of growing dairy calves

Integrated multi-omics of the gastrointestinal microbiome and ruminant host reveals metabolic adaptation underlying early life development

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