Submitted Abstract
Microbial consortia in the human intestine play a pivotal role in health and disease. When exposed to different environmental conditions such as varying diets, genetic changes and drugs the diversity of bacterial communities in the gut is shifted and different metabolites are utilized, which has beneficial or detrimental effects on the host. However, the nature of these changes in community structure is still poorly understood. The aim of the project is to apply state-of-the-art methods in systems biology and ecology to create a robust in silico model of microbial consortia for predicting changes according to various subjected perturbations. The predictions will be experimentally tested in a in vitro co-culture with metabolomics and community profiling to validate and refine the computational approach. The final model will allow further studies on human health and disease with respect to intestinal microbial communities.