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Jessica L Gifford, Improving Equivalency in Metagenomics: A Harmonized Process to Extract Fecal DNA, Clinical Chemistry, Volume 64, Issue 6, 1 June 2018, Pages 983–984, https://doi.org/10.1373/clinchem.2018.286518
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In the field of clinical chemistry, there is a major push to harmonize and standardize laboratory processes and materials to improve the equivalency of reported test results and reduce the risk of postanalytical errors. The impetus of harmonized results is expanding to the field of molecular pathology and is seen in the development of standardized reference materials for the measurement of pathogens in clinical samples, and the harmonization of PCR and fluorescence in situ hybridization methods for noninvasive prenatal diagnosis and cancer screening, respectively. Molecular methods are used to study microbial communities in the human body to assess contributions of microbiota to human health. Microbiota in the gastrointestinal tract comprise one of the best studied ecosystems owing to their large volume, high diversity, and relevance to several pathologies (e.g., diabetes, inflammatory bowel disease, and colorectal cancer). Until now, most studies in gut microbiota have used unique methodologies resulting in demographically distinct cohorts. This has limited the potential for interstudy comparisons and metaanalyses, as it is difficult to disentangle biological from methodological variation. To address the technical variation in metagenomics and more confidently assess contributions of microbiota to human health, a recent article by Costea et al.(1) suggests that a harmonized protocol outlined by the authors be used to extract DNA from feces.
