Towards a better understanding of rumen microbiome and animal performance
Dairy cattle depend on the microbiological processes within the rumen to deriv e assimilatable nutrients for maintenance and production of milk precursors that are used by the host to produce milk.Therefore,optimization of the microbiological processes through manipulating the rumen microbiome and their metabolism remain the holy grail for the intensively managed dairy herds in China and beyond.Although some of the microbes resident of the rumen have been isolated and studied in the past century and some of the metabolic processes of the isolated microbes,primarily bacteria,have been elucidated in test tubes,our knowledge on the microbiological processes remains very limited and fragmented for several reasons.First,only a few metabolic processes in a limited number of bacteria have been determined.Second,some of these ex-situ metabolic processes may not typically occur in the rumen.Third,the actual microbiological processes and functions of the rumen microbiome cannot be determined from the sum of the metabolism of individual microbes.Therefore,collective studies of the rumen microbiome with respect to its composition,structure,digestion of feed and subsequent fermentation,and microbial protein synthesis,are required to really elucidate the microbiological underpinning of feed conversion to milk precursors.Recently,metagenomics began to be applied to studies of rumen microbiome.Metagenomics allow detailed studies of composition and structure of rumen microbiome as well as genetic potential thereof.A number of metagenomic studies have been reported on rumen microbiome.Although new knowledge on diversity,both phylogenetic and functional,has been obtained,few studies linked metagenomic data to phenotypic data (i.e.,feed digestion,fermentation,or milk production),making these studies empirical rather than mechanistic.
Zhongtang Yu
Department of Animal Sciences, The Ohio State University, Columbus, Ohio, USA
国际会议
3rd International Symposium on Dairy Cow Nutrition and Milk Quality(第三届“奶牛营养与牛奶质量国际研讨会)
北京
英文
25-31
2013-05-11（万方平台首次上网日期，不代表论文的发表时间）