Figure 1.

The impact of methods that can be used to collect feces before laboratory handling. When the fecal samples are transported to a biology lab within 4 h, they only need to be placed in a white opaque polypropylene pot with a transparent lid and a white opaque pot to hold the bag. Then, the samples are frozen and shipped on dry–ice to the lab (A). When the samples can be brought to the laboratory within 4–24 h, tools should be used to add a white anaerobic generator paper bag on the basis of A to maintain a anaerobic atmosphere (B). The plastic tubes, which have a spoon attached to their lids, are used to collect feces when the transit time is longer than 1 day. Fill up to two-thirds of the spoon with feces, and do not overfill. Then, the spoon and anaerobic generator paper bag are inserted in the opaque plastic bag (C). Plastic tubes containing the stabilizing solution can keep the fecal DNA stable at room temperature for a few days (D).