A core gut microbiome in obese and lean twins

Total community DNA was isolated from the feces of monozygotic and dizygotic twins and their mothers. We have characterized the fecal microbial communities of adult female monozygotic and dizygotic twin pairs concordant for leanness or obesity, and their mothers. The results demonstrate that a diversity of organismal assemblages can nonetheless yield a core microbiome at a functional level, and that deviations from this core are associated with different physiologic states (obese versus lean). FJ362604-FJ372382 correspond to 16S ribosomal RNA sequences isolated from this study. 454 sequence data is available from the Short Read Archive (SRA): SRA002775.