The cheese smear of a Swiss semi-hard red-smear cheese variety was analyzed for comparison of the microbial surface smear community patterns of cheeses differing in their smear quality.
Amplified 16S rDNA amplicons were sequenced using GS FLX Titanium chemistry on a 454 genome sequencer FLX platform (Roche Diagnostics Ltd., Burgess Hill, West Sussex, United Kingdom) according to Roche 454 protocols.