10:28:29 From Hanieh Shakeri Moghaddam to Everyone : you mentioned that each person has different colon microbiota and the fecal microbiome is specific in each person. I was wondering if this is the case, how FMT can be used as a treatment for different diseases since normal microbiota is various in different people? 11:03:34 From Avi Flamholz to Everyone : Andreas — two questions: are the oligosaccharides broken down intracellularly or extracellularly? also - why is it that the anabolic substrates change less? 11:05:05 From Avi Flamholz to Everyone : because presence/absence of appropriate secretion systems could explain limited range of horizontal transfer of oligosaccharide catabolism 11:13:19 From Hector Hernandez to Everyone : Are the global functions/reactions present in the microbial community maintained despite the order in which microbial species arrive? 11:13:47 From Avi Flamholz to Everyone : this has been shown in a number of cases that I know of 11:14:35 From Otto X. Cordero to Everyone : Hi Hector, that’s the common thought, indeed. But if you actually look at the details it’s not so clear. It depends what you mean by function. The answer I guess is, yes for some pathways, but not for others. 11:14:48 From Avi Flamholz to Everyone : see louca et al nature eco evolution 2018 for a nice review 11:15:21 From Hector Hernandez to Everyone : Thank you Otto and Avi! 11:15:30 From Otto X. Cordero to Everyone : What people have done is just show that COG categories are more stable than OTUs, but there are many problems with that type of analysis. I’d say is an open problem despite the many publications reinforcing this preconception 11:17:35 From Römhild Roderich to Everyone : Is there something like “ecosystem engineering” by microbes to explain priority effects? 11:18:00 From Alfred Spormann to Everyone : Tom might get into this next week. 11:22:03 From Thomas Schmidt to Everyone : Yes, I will focus on ecological engineering next week. This is a great introduction and sets the stage nicely. 11:34:03 From Cindy Gustafson-Brown to Everyone : Regarding the consequences of antibiotic treatment, let’s say the antibiotic kills a subset of bacteria. After antibiotic treatment, probiotics may *not* be effective to re-colonize the intestine with particular bacteria. Is this because those that persisted through the Abx treatment have filled up the niches that were vacated? Is the inevitable outcome less diversity in the microbiota? 11:54:56 From Alfred Spormann to Kavli Institute for Theoretical Physics(Direct Message) : Tom will send some questions before the lecture next week. To whom should he send those? 12:51:44 From Vijay Jayaraman to Everyone : Many bacteria uses aminoacid/polyamine antiporters to buffer change in intracellular pH. Was wondering if there is any study done to quantify polyamines that are abundant in the gut and their role in dictating microbiota composition? Can such mechanism be involved in the pH buffering when using acetate as the carbon source (as you said acetic acid becomes acetate in the cytosol)? 12:59:20 From Hector Hernandez to Everyone : Considering that the species concepts for bacteria may be debatable, then would it be more informative to talk about molecular composition or metabolic pathways present in a microbial community when exposed to a given environment instead of taxa and species composition? 13:01:39 From Hector Hernandez to Everyone : (Also considering the interesting point raised by Otto at 20:15, CET) 13:02:25 From Vijay Jayaraman to Everyone : May be there is some nitrate assimilation components in E. coli forms a metabolon? 13:02:45 From Malaika Ebert to Everyone : very interesting talk! Danke! 13:03:03 From Martin Jahn to Everyone : Great talk !!! 13:03:04 From Hector Hernandez to Everyone : Thank you very much!