475: Modifying Mixed Microbiota

This episode: New techniques allow specific modifications in
certain members of a complex community of microbes, without
isolating them in pure culture first!


Download Episode (11.5 MB, 16.7 minutes)

Show notes:
Microbe of the episode: Tomato golden mosaic virus


News item


Takeaways





The technology for understanding and manipulating microbial
genetics has come a long way in a short time. It used to
take years even to sequence a small genome, and now
thousands can be sequenced in just a few days. The
technology to change and even create genetic sequences is
also much further advanced now than just a few decades ago.
But still, many analyses and modifications require a pure
culture of a microbe to carry out.

This study tested a method for modification of single or
multiple species in a community of many. The method allows
for identification of which species were successfully
modified in targeted ways, and can allow the modified
species to be extracted and studied individually.


 
Journal Paper:
Rubin BE, Diamond S, Cress BF, Crits-Christoph A, Lou YC,
Borges AL, Shivram H, He C, Xu M, Zhou Z, Smith SJ, Rovinsky
R, Smock DCJ, Tang K, Owens TK, Krishnappa N, Sachdeva R,
Barrangou R, Deutschbauer AM, Banfield JF, Doudna JA. 2022.
Species- and site-specific genome editing in complex
bacterial communities. 1. Nat Microbiol 7:34–47.

 


Other interesting stories:



Microbes that degrade plastic may be increasing in
response to plastic pollution

Algae in ocean communicate with each other using
fluorescence




 


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