Schroeter Joel, Klaenhammer Todd
Department of Food Science, Bioprocessing and Nutrition Sciences, North Carolina State University, Raleigh, NC 27695-7624, USA.
FEMS Microbiol Lett. 2009 Mar;292(1):1-6. doi: 10.1111/j.1574-6968.2008.01442.x. Epub 2008 Dec 11.
Lactic acid bacteria (LAB) are found to occupy a variety of ecological niches including fermented foods as well as mucosal surfaces of humans and other vertebrates. This review is based on the genomic content of LAB that is responsible for the functional and ecological diversity of these bacteria. These genomes reveal an ongoing process of reductive evolution as the LAB have specialized to different nutritionally rich environments. Species-to-species variation in the number of pseudogenes as well as genes directing nutrient uptake and metabolism reflects the adaptation of LAB to food matrices and the gastrointestinal tract. Although a general trend of genome reduction was observed, certain niche-specific genes appear to be recently acquired and appear on plasmids or adjacent to prophages. Recent work has improved our understanding of the genomic content responsible for various phenotypes that continue to be discovered, as well as those that have been exploited by man for thousands of years.
乳酸菌（LAB）被发现存在于多种生态位中，包括发酵食品以及人类和其他脊椎动物的黏膜表面。本综述基于乳酸菌的基因组内容，这些内容决定了这些细菌的功能和生态多样性。这些基因组揭示了一个正在进行的简化进化过程，因为乳酸菌已经适应了不同营养丰富的环境。假基因数量以及指导营养物质摄取和代谢的基因在物种间的差异反映了乳酸菌对食物基质和胃肠道的适应性。尽管观察到了基因组简化的总体趋势，但某些特定生态位的基因似乎是最近获得的，并且出现在质粒上或原噬菌体附近。最近的研究工作增进了我们对负责各种表型的基因组内容的理解，这些表型仍在不断被发现，以及那些人类已经利用了数千年的表型。
