Fig. 6

Analysis of abundance of core OTUs identified in Donor A MBRA communities as a function of time in culture. We determined the abundance of the 94 OTUs that were identified as present in individual core communities for MBRAs inoculated with fecal donor A or were abundant in the donor A fecal sample as described in Fig. 5 and plotted the abundance of these OTUs in the fecal sample and over time in culture (days 1–21) across the three replicate reactors. Data are organized by phylum, with the lowest taxonomic classification assigned with confidence listed on the left hand side. Magnitude of shading is indicated on the figure and ranges from 1 to ≥256 sequences for Firmicutes, Bacteroidetes, and Proteobacteria. Abundance of Actinobacteria sequences range from 1 to 4 sequences; whereas the abundance of the single Verrucomicrobia OTU range from 1 to ≥1024 sequences. The line at the left end of the x-axis indicates the fecal sample. The triangles demarcate time in cultures for the different replicate reactors, with the first time point present on the left side for each replicate. Similar heat maps for donor B and donor C are available in Additional files 8 and 9