Heinken,A, Khan,MT, Paglia,G, Rodionov,DA, Harmsen,HJ, Thiele,I,J Bacteriol 196:3289-3302, 2014
The human gut microbiota plays a central role in human well-being and disease. In this study, we present an integrated, iterative approach of computational modelling, in vitro experiments, metabolomics, and genomic analysis to accelerate the identification of metabolic capabilities for poorly characterized(anaerobic) microorganisms.
We demonstrate this approach for the beneficial human gut microbeFaecalibacterium prausnitzii strain A2-165. We generated an automated draft reconstruction, which we curated against the limited biochemical data. This reconstruction modelling was used to develop in silicon and in vitro a chemically defined medium (CDM), which was validated experimentally.
