Journal Article

Metagenomic Discovery of Biomass-Degrading Genes and Genomes from Cow Rumen

Woyke, Tanja, Sczyrba, Alexander, Clark, Douglas S., Rubin, Edward M., Kim, Tae-Wan, Luo, Shujun, Tringe, Susannah G., Chokhawala, Harshal, Mackie, Roderick I., Pennacchio, Len A., Chen, Feng, Visel, Axel, Egan, Rob, Wang, Zhong, Hess, Matthias, Schroth, Gary, Zhang, Tao

2011

Overview

The paucity of enzymes that efficiently deconstruct plant polysaccharides represents a major bottleneck for industrial-scale conversion of cellulosic biomass into biofuels. Cow rumen microbes specialize in degradation of cellulosic plant material, but most members of this complex community resist cultivation. To characterize biomass-degrading genes and genomes, we sequenced and analyzed 268 gigabases of metagenomic DNA from microbes adherent to plant fiber incubated in cow rumen. From these data, we identified 27,755 putative carbohydrate-active genes and expressed 90 candidate proteins, of which 57% were enzymatically active against cellulosic substrates. We also assembled 15 uncultured microbial genomes, which were validated by complementary methods including single-cell genome sequencing. These data sets provide a substantially expanded catalog of genes and genomes participating in the deconstruction of cellulosic biomass.

• Publisher: American Association for the Advancement of Science,The American Association for the Advancement of Science
• Subject: Amino Acid Sequence / Animals / Bacteria - enzymology / Bacteria - genetics / Bacteria - isolation & purification / Bacteria - metabolism / Bacterial Proteins - chemistry / Bacterial Proteins - genetics / Bacterial Proteins - metabolism / Biofuels / Biological and medical sciences / Biomass / Biotechnology / Carbohydrate Metabolism / Cattle / Cattle - microbiology / Cellulase - genetics / Cellulase - metabolism / Cellulases - chemistry / Cellulases - genetics / Cellulases - metabolism / Cellulose / Cellulose - metabolism / Cellulose 1,4-beta-Cellobiosidase - genetics / Cellulose 1,4-beta-Cellobiosidase - metabolism / Classical genetics, quantitative genetics, hybrids / cows / data collection / Datasets / DNA / Energy crops / Enzymes / Fundamental and applied biological sciences. Psychology / genes / Genes, Bacterial / Genetics of eukaryotes. Biological and molecular evolution / Genome, Bacterial / Genomes / Genomics / Metagenome / Metagenomics / Metagenomics - methods / Microorganisms / Molecular Sequence Annotation / Molecular Sequence Data / plant fibers / Poaceae - microbiology / polysaccharides / proteins / Rumen / Rumen - metabolism / Rumen - microbiology / rumen microorganisms / Saccharides / Scaffolds / sequence analysis / Sequence Analysis, DNA / Sequencing / Vertebrata