Figure 4.

From genome to physiology and ecology of a species. The interaction with their environment over evolutionary times has shaped the physiology of microorganisms, which is contained in their genomes. We assume that, in reverse, the genome informs on a species' physiology and ecology. This figure indicates how one may derive relationships between genomic information on the one hand and physiological and ecological characteristics on the other hand. These relationships or “rules” will further aid the modeling of microbial communities and functioning by bottom-up approaches.