title: [Gut microbiota and digestion of polysaccharides].
abstract: The distal gut microbiota corresponds to all the microorganisms, essentially bacteria, that reside commonly in the colon. The microbial population is characterized by a large taxonomical diversity, counting approximately a thousand distinct bacterial species for a single individual. The pace of investigations of this microbial system has greatly accelerated these last few years, fuelled by the advent of metagenomics techniques, which do not rely on bacterial cultivation, but utilize high throughput DNA sequencing. In just a few years studies of the intestinal microbiota have become fashionable, albeit with often contradictory results when attempting to correlate changes in microbial composition to diverse pathologies. The article focuses on one of the essential functions of the distal gut microbiota: the digestion of the immense variety of polysaccharides from our diet that enzymes of the host cannot breakdown.
authors.affiliation: Centre national de la recherche scientifique, UMR 7257, 13288 Marseille, France - URMITE, UM63, CNRS 7278, Institut de recherche pour le développement 198, Inserm 1095, université Aix-Marseille, faculté de médecine, Marseille, France.
authors.forename: Abdessamad
authors.initials: A
authors.lastname: El Kaoutari
authors.affiliation: URMITE, UM63, CNRS 7278, Institut de recherche pour le développement 198, Inserm 1095, université Aix-Marseille, faculté de médecine, Marseille, France.
authors.forename: Fabrice
authors.initials: F
authors.lastname: Armougom
authors.affiliation: URMITE, UM63, CNRS 7278, Institut de recherche pour le développement 198, Inserm 1095, université Aix-Marseille, faculté de médecine, Marseille, France.
authors.forename: Didier
authors.initials: D
authors.lastname: Raoult
authors.affiliation: Centre national de la recherche scientifique, UMR 7257, 13288 Marseille, France - Université Aix-Marseille, architecture et fonction des macromolécules biologiques, 163, avenue de Luminy, 13288 Marseille Cedex 9, France - Department of cellular and molecular medicine, faculty of health and medical sciences, University of Copenhagen, DK-2200 Copenhague, Danemark.
authors.forename: Bernard
authors.initials: B
authors.lastname: Henrissat
mesh_terms: D000818:Animals; D001419:Bacteria / Q000378:metabolism; D004063:Digestion / Q000502:physiology*; D005285:Fermentation / Q000502:physiology; D041981:Gastrointestinal Tract / Q000378:metabolism / Q000382:microbiology*; D006801:Humans; D006868:Hydrolysis; D007413:Intestinal Mucosa / Q000378:metabolism; D007422:Intestines / Q000382:microbiology; D064307:Microbiota / Q000502:physiology*; D011134:Polysaccharides / Q000378:metabolism*
chemical_list: D011134:Polysaccharides