An integrated method for functional analysis of microbial communities by gene ontology based on 16S miRNA gene

Abstract

The environment and human serve as elaborate hosts of microbes, including a diversity of commensal and pathogenic bacteria that contribute to both health and diseases. 16S rRNA genes are useful for community profiling, or determining the abundance of each kind of microbe. The purpose of our study is to analyze the similarity among microbial communities on functional state after assigning 16S rRNA sequences from all microbial communities to species. It's an important addition to the species-level relationship between two compared communities, and can quantify their differences in function. To accomplish this aim, we downloaded all functional annotation data of microbiota from related datasets. It's developed to identify the functional distribution and the significantly enriched functional categories of microbial communities. Exploration of the function relationship between two sets of species assemblages will be a key result of microbiome studies and may provide new insights into assembly of a wide range of ecosystems. © Springer-Verlag Berlin Heidelberg 2013.