Metaproteome analysis to determine the metabolically active part of a thermophilic microbial community producing biogas from agricultural biomass

Complex consortia of microorganisms are responsible for biogas production. A lot of information about the taxonomic structure and enzymatic potential of such communities has been collected by a variety of gene-based approaches, yet little is known about which of all the assumable metabolic pathways are active throughout the process of biogas formation. To tackle this problem, we established a protocol for the metaproteomic analysis of samples taken from biogas reactors fed with agricultural biomass. In contrast to previous studies where an anaerobic digester was fed with synthetic wastewater, the complex matrix in this study required the extraction of proteins with liquid phenol and the application of paper bridge loading for 2-dimensional gel electrophoresis. Proteins were subjected to nanoHPLC (high-performance liquid chromatography) coupled to tandem mass spectrometry for characterization. Several housekeeping proteins as well as methanogenesis-related enzymes were identified by a MASCOT search and de novo sequencing, which proved the feasibility of our approach. The establishment of such an approach is the basis for further metaproteomic studies of biogas-producing communities. In particular, the apparent status of metabolic activities within the communities can be monitored. The knowledge collected from such experiments could lead to further improvements of biogas production.