Metaproteomics reveals persistent and phylum-redundant metabolic functional stability in adult human gut microbiomes of Crohn's remission patients despite temporal variations in microbial taxa, genomes, and proteomes.

The human gut metaproteome can vary quite substantially across time and individuals. However, despite substantial intra-individual variation in the metaproteomes, there is a clear persistence of conserved metabolic functions across time and individuals. Additionally, the persistence of these core functions is redundant across multiple phyla but is not always observable in the same sample. Finally, the gut microbiome's metabolism is not driven by a set of discrete linear pathways but a web of interconnected reactions facilitated by a network of enzymes that connect multiple molecules across multiple pathways.