RUMEN MICROBIOME DYNAMICS IN DIFFERENT DIETARY CONDITIONS
Rumen microbiome is an extremely complex environment harboring thousand of microbial species and including bacteria, archaea and eukaryotes. Many projects in the past few years tried to unravel the microbial composition of this environment due to the importance it has from a biotechnological and microbiologcal point of view. Moreover, the presence on Earth of 3.5 billions ruminants led to relevant environmental problems determined by the production of high quantities of methane (an important greenhous gas) and of other polluttans like ammonia that have an adverse effect if released in the environment. One of the main determinants of the rumen microbial composition is the diet composition, modifications can reduce the methane production but can also have a negative effect of milk and meat productivity.
The aim of this project is the identification of the genome sequences of the most abundant microbial species present in cow rumen and the clarification of their ability to degrade dietary compounds.
This project is in collaboration with Viviana Corich, Alessio Giacomini, Stefano Schiavon e Franco Tagliapietra (DAFNAE Department UNIPD).
UNDER CONSTRUCTION