Host - microbiota coevolution in the intestine

Research in a multitude of biomedical disciplines in the last decade has highlighted the importance of the bacterial communities inhabiting our intestinal tract. This is in part due to the rapidly growing field of metagenomics, which enables genetic material to be studied directly from the environment. Although they are most widely known for their role in transfusion medicine and immunology, many blood group antigens are expressed in the intestine and influence resident bacteria. Our current work in this field focuses on the blood-group related glycosyltransferase B4galnt2.