Back in December we wrote about the human microbiota and how the microbiome contributes more to the human physiology than we think; disregulation of the microbiome has been linked to chronic C. difficile infection, diabetes, obesity, inflammatory bowel disease, Crohn's disease, and perhaps even autism. Altering the microbiome of affected individuals so that they resemble "healthy" individuals through fecal transplant has been shown to reverse the symptoms of many of these diseases showing that disorder is linked to a change of physiology due to changes in the microbiota (in fact, fecal transplant is more effective than antibiotics in treating chronic C. difficile). Before we go putting fecal transplant on a pede-stool, the scientists and the FDA are still debating how to regulate this bowel movement movement (it's a hard job, but somebody's got to poo it!).Microbiome research is one of the fastest emerging areas of research. Next generation sequencing is pushing this area of research to flush out our understanding of how the microbiome contributes to our physiology. NGS allows rapid analysis of mixed sequences to determine not only the the species of microbes present, but the exact composition of a microbial community.
To support NGS workflows, Aurora offers the VERSA GENE, a complete walk-away solution for genomics workflows including NGS library preparation (grab your newspaper and take some time for yourself). The accurate liquid handling provides consistency between library preps and this open-system platform allows researchers to leverage different library preparation kits and chemistries available to fully realize everything that NGS can poo. At Aurora we believe that supporting science that can truly make a difference is not just a job, it's our doody!
