Metagenomics of insect gut: new borders of microbial big data

Abstract:

Microbes, the ubiquitous organisms in nature, usually live in the "microbial community". A microbial community usually contains tens to thousands of different microorganisms, where they cooperate with each other to adapt to changes in the environment to complete the evolution of life, while their life activities also have a long and profound impact on the environment. With a better understanding of microorganisms, basic research on microbial community and its application in the field of health and the environment is increasingly important. There are a large number and a wide variety of microbes in the intestine of insects. On the one hand, the diversity of these intestinal microbial populations is closely related to insect species, age, digestive tract form, food source and environment. On the other hand, these microflora also have some effect on the host's physiological activities. With the development of high-throughput sequencing technology and omics technology, the use of molecular biology technology to quickly, qualitatively and quantitatively study insect intestinal microbes has become a popular filed. Data mining and application on insect intestine metagenome will greatly promote our ability to use microbial resources. This paper summarizes the development of metagenomics of insect intestinal, especially the excavation tools and applications of large data of intestinal genome and the research progress, application, advantages, as well as bottlenecks of metagenomics in insect intestine. The future research direction of insect microbial population is also forecasted.

Key words:metagenomics;insect gut;high throughput sequencing;biological data