A systematic discussion and comparison of the construction methods of synthetic microbial community

Abstract

Synthetic microbial community has widely concerned in the fields of agriculture, food and environment over the past few years. However, there is little consensus on the method to synthetic microbial community from construction to functional verification. Here, we review the concept, characteristics, history and applications of synthetic microbial community, summarizing several methods for synthetic microbial community construction, such as isolation culture, core microbiome mining, automated design, and gene editing. In addition, we also systematically summarized the design concepts, technological thresholds, and applicable scenarios of various construction methods, and highlighted their advantages and limitations. Ultimately, this review provides four efficient, detailed, easy-to-understand and -follow steps for synthetic microbial community construction, with major implications for agricultural practices, food production, and environmental governance.