Sequence Capture to Monitor Functional Potential of Microbial Communities
Microorganisms play key roles in environmental functioning and understanding their responses to environmental perturbation is critical to developing accurate climate change models, a need highlighted by the DOE. However, their phylogenetic and functional diversity, abundance in the environment, and lack of cultured status make microorganisms challenging to study. While there are several molecular methods available that have been extremely important in advancing our knowledge of microbial ecology, there are serious drawbacks to each of the available methods. In Phase I of this project, we tested the use of a sequence capture method on microbial communities using mock microbial communities and capture probes for 3 different genes (nifH, nirK, and dsrA). We optimized library preparation steps and then tested mock communities with different proportions of members and different hybridization conditions. Our Phase I work demonstrated the feasibility of using this technology for capturing and enriching specific functional genes from microbial communities.