Identification of age-associated microbial changes via long-read 16S sequencing

The utilization of long-read sequencing facilitated the identification of species- and strain-level differences across age groups, which was challenging with the partial 16S rRNA sequencing approach. Nevertheless, replication studies are warranted to confirm our findings, and if confirmed, further in vitro and in vivo studies are crucial to better understand the impact of the altered levels of age-related bacterial taxa. Additionally, the modest performance of strain-level taxonomic classification using 16S-ITS-23S gene sequences, likely due to the limited depth of currently available alignment databases, highlights the need for optimization and refinement in curating these databases for the long-read sequencing approach.