Comprehensive detection of bacterial carbohydrate-active enzyme coding genes expressed in cow rumen.

To find the abundant and characteristic fibrolytic enzyme-coding gene expressed in fiber-associating microbiota, a metatranscriptomic data set was obtained from fiber-associating microbiota, and it was compared with that of rumen fluid-floating microbiota and two metagenomic data sets. Fibrolytic rumen bacteria associate with plant polysaccharide and hydrolyze it in the rumen. We obtained a metatranscriptomic assembly from fiber-associating microbiota in three ruminally fistulated Holstein cows fed timothy (Phleum pratense) hay. Each metatranscriptomic data set involved over a thousand of the glycoside hydrolase (GH) gene transcripts that accounted for about 1% of total protein coding gene transcripts. Three-quarters of the total GH gene transcripts were dominated by non-structural oligosaccharide-acting hydrolase gene transcripts. In the fiber-associating microbiota, endo-cellulase coding gene families, especially GHs 9 and 5, were abundantly detected, and GHs 9, 11, 30 and 43, carbohydrate esterase 8 and carbohydrate-binding module 6 were characteristically detected. Most fibrolytic gene transcripts assigned to Fibrobacter succinogenes were detected in fiber-associating sections, and GHs 45, 44, 74, 11, 30 and 16 were Fibrobacter-characteristically detected. The metatranscriptomic assembly highlighted the characteristic fibrolytic enzymes expressed in the fiber-associated rumen microbiota and offered access to the fibrolytic activities in each fibrolytic bacteria.