The exploitation of metagenomics and meta-omics approaches in life science research; community network in metagenomics

微生物在我们的环境中起着至关重要的作用，它们占据了广泛的栖息地，从我们的肠道和身体表面一直到海底的热喷口，它们在土壤中对养分的循环和植物健康至关重要，并负责消化牛的特殊胃（称为瘤胃）中分解的草中的纤维素，以及通过收集阳光在海洋中进行碳的全球循环，因为许多细菌可以进行光合作用，从而收集光能来固定二氧化碳。我们研究这些微生物的生理和整体活动的能力存在一个主要问题，因为我们（目前）还不能在实验室中分离和培养绝大多数（可能超过98%）微生物。我们知道它们的存在，因为我们使用了类似于DNA法医方法的方法来检测它们，仅仅基于它们的DNA，使用特征基因，使我们能够识别和分类它们。这种多样性主要是细菌，但也有几类真菌。研究这些微生物种群的新方法正在被开发，这被称为宏基因组学，因此我们将微生物群落作为许多基因组的群体来研究，而不是试图分离和研究一个基因组。我们可以通过提取和分析DNA来进行多样性分析，提取和分析RNA来进行基因表达，提取和分析蛋白质来确定活性和代谢产物，从而确定生理学。此外，我们可以提取DNA并将其表达在其他可培养的细菌中。这使我们能够捕获DNA并表达它，从而深入了解某些功能，例如具有特殊性质的特定酶或色素。拟议工作的目的是建立一个学术合作伙伴网络，以建立这一重要科学领域的能力，以确保我们能够研究和利用细菌种群的所有有趣和令人兴奋的属性，并利用它们实现可持续的未来。

Microrganisms play a vital role in our environment they occupy a wide range of habitats from our onw gut and body surfaces all the way to hot vents under the sea, they are critical in the soil for recycling of nutrients and plant health and responsible for the essential digestion of cellulose from grass being broken down in the specialised stomach of the cow termed the rumen to the global cycling of carbon in the oceans via harvesting of sunlight as many bacteria can photosynthesize and thus harvest light energy to fix carbon dioxide. A major problem exists in our ability to study the physiology and overall activities of these microbes due to the fact that we cannot isolate and cultivate (yet) the vast majority (probably over 98%) of them in the laboratory. We know they exist because we have used methods similar to DNA forensic approaches to detect them solely based on their DNA using signature genes which allow us to identify and group them. Most of this diversity is bacterial but there are also several groups of fungi. New methods are being developed for the study of these microbial populations and this is called metagenomics so that we study the microbial community as a population of many genomes rather than trying to isolate and study one. We can study this population in our guts or in the soil by extracting and analysing DNA for diversity analysis, RNA for gene expression and protein for confirmation of activities and metabolites to determine physiology. In addition we can extract DNA and express it in other bacteria which are culturable. This allows us to capture the DNA and express it thus gaining an insight into some functions such as specific enzymes or pigments with special properties. The imof the proposed work is to establish a network of academic partners to build capacity in this important area of science to ensure that we are able to study and exploit all the interesting and exciting attributes of bacterial populations and harness them for a sustainable future.