An investigation of the microbial population in different regions of the large intestine of the horse by 454 pyrosequencing

The aim of the study was to investigate the microbial population within different regions of the large intestine of the horse for healthy animals on a fibre based diet. A further question investigated was if there is a core microbial population found in all animals. Samples of luminal gut contents were collected from the terminal ileum and seven regions of the large intestine (caecum, right ventral colon (RVC), left ventral colon (LVC), left dorsal colon (LDC), right dorsal colon (RDC), small colon (SC) and the rectum) from five thoroughbred horses) and five British native breed ponies) euthanized for non-research purposes. Samples were taken in triplicate (240 samples in total).Genomic DNA was extracted, the V1-V2 region of the 16SrRNA was amplified before being sequenced using the Roche 454 GS FLX Titanium series sequencer.