Metagenomic species profiling using universal phylogenetic marker genes

Shinichi Sunagawa, Daniel R. Mende, Georg Zeller, Fernando Izquierdo-Carrasco, Simon A. Berger, Jens Roat Kultima, Luis Pedro Coelho, Manimozhiyan Arumugam, Julien Tap, Henrik Bjørn Nielsen, Simon Rasmussen, Søren Brunak, Oluf Borbye Pedersen, Francisco Guarner, Willem M de Vos, Jun Wang, Junhua Li, Joël Doré, S Dusko Ehrlich, Alexandros StamatakisPeer Bork

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365 Citations (Scopus)

Abstract

To quantify known and unknown microorganisms at species-level resolution using shotgun sequencing data, we developed a method that establishes metagenomic operational taxonomic units (mOTUs) based on single-copy phylogenetic marker genes. Applied to 252 human fecal samples, the method revealed that on average 43% of the species abundance and 58% of the richness cannot be captured by current reference genome-based methods. An implementation of the method is available at http://www.bork.embl.de/software/mOTU/.
Original languageEnglish
JournalNature Methods
Volume10
Issue number12
Pages (from-to)1196-1199
Number of pages4
ISSN1548-7091
DOIs
Publication statusPublished - 2013

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