Refining microbiome diversity analysis by concatenating and integrating dual 16S rRNA amplicon reads.

ABSTRACT: Understanding the role of human gut microbiota in health and disease requires insights into its taxonomic composition and functional capabilities. This study evaluates whether concatenating paired-end reads enhances data output for gut microbiome analysis compared to the merging approach across various regions of the 16S rRNA gene. We assessed this approach in both mock communities and Korean cohorts with or without ulcerative colitis. Our results indicate that using the direct joining method for the V1-V3 or V6-V8 regions improves taxonomic resolution compared to merging paired-end reads (ME) in post-sequencing data. While predicting microbial function based on 16S rRNA sequencing has inherent limitations, integrating sequencing reads from both the V1-V3 and V6-V8 regions enhanced functio

SUBMITTER: Kim KS 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC11993755 | biostudies-literature | 2025 Apr

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature