Analysis of plant derived alkaloids on rumen microbiota using an in vitro Rusitec system. Phytobiotic analysis in vitro

Rumen microbiota have important metabolic functions for the host animal. This study aimed at characterizing changes in rumen microbial abundances and predicted metabolic pathways using an in vitro model, and to evaluate a potential modulatory role of plant derived alkaloids (PDA) using MiSeq paired ends sequencing and PICRUSt predicitve metabolic pathway analysis. The measurement of community diversity showed an exponential increase and eventual plateau for all samples. Beta diversity analysis showed high levels of variation between individual fermenters, resulting in high variation within treatments.