16S rRNA gene copy number normalization does not provide more reliable conclusions in metataxonomic surveys

Sequencing 16S rRNA gene amplicons is the gold standard to uncover the composition of prokaryotic communities. The presence of multiple copies of this gene makes the community abundance data distorted and gene copy normalization (GCN) necessary for correction. Even though GCN of 16S data provided a...

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Detalles Bibliográficos
Autores: Starke, Robert, Pylro, Victor Satler, Morais, Daniel Kumazawa
Tipo de recurso: artículo
Estado:Versión publicada
Fecha de publicación:2021
País:Brasil
Institución:Universidade Federal de Lavras (UFLA)
Repositorio:Repositório Institucional da UFLA
Idioma:inglés
OAI Identifier:oai:repositorio.ufla.br:1/46399
Acceso en línea:https://repositorio.ufla.br/handle/1/46399
Access Level:acceso abierto
Palabra clave:16S rRNA
Metataxonomic surveys
Prokaryotic communities
Gene copy normalization
Levantamentos metataxonômicos
Comunidades procarióticas
Normalização da cópia do gene
Descripción
Sumario:Sequencing 16S rRNA gene amplicons is the gold standard to uncover the composition of prokaryotic communities. The presence of multiple copies of this gene makes the community abundance data distorted and gene copy normalization (GCN) necessary for correction. Even though GCN of 16S data provided a picture closer to the metagenome before, it should also be compared with communities of known composition due to the fact that library preparation is prone to methodological biases. Here, we process 16S rRNA gene amplicon data from eleven simple mock communities with DADA2 and estimate the impact of GCN. In all cases, the mock community composition derived from the 16S sequencing differs from those expected, and GCN fails to improve the classification for most of the analysed communities. Our approach provides empirical evidence that GCN does not improve the 16S target sequencing analyses in real scenarios. We therefore question the use of GCN for metataxonomic surveys until a more comprehensive catalogue of copy numbers becomes available.