The Variability of the 16S rRNA Gene in Bacterial Genomes and Its Consequences for Bacterial Community Analyses

16S ribosomal RNA currently represents the most important target of study in bacterial ecology. Its use for the description of bacterial diversity is, however, limited by the presence of variable copy numbers in bacterial genomes and sequence variation within closely related taxa or within a genome. Here we use the information from sequenced bacterial genomes to explore the variability of 16S rRNA sequences and copy numbers at various taxonomic levels and apply it to estimate bacterial genome and DNA abundances. In total, 7,081 16S rRNA sequences were in silico extracted from 1,690 available bacterial genomes (1-15 per genome). While there are several phyla containing low 16S rRNA copy numbers, in certain…

• MŠ
  Ministerstvo Školství, Mládeže a Tělovýchovy

  Awards: LD12050, RVO61388971
• AV
  Akademie Věd České Republiky

  Award: RVO61388971