Deciphering Diversity Indices for a Better Understanding of Microbial Communities

The past decades have been a golden era during which great tasks were accomplished in the field of microbiology, including food microbiology. In the past, culture-dependent methods have been the primary choice to investigate bacterial diversity. However, using cultureindependent high-throughput sequencing of 16S rRNA genes has greatly facilitated studies exploring the microbial compositions and dynamics associated with health and diseases. These culture-independent DNA-based studies generate large-scale data sets that describe the microbial composition of a certain niche. Consequently, understanding microbial diversity becomes of greater importance when investigating the composition, function, and dynamics of…