What is Metagenomics?

Metagenomics is a laboratory process that allows scientists to isolate one genetic code from a sample of many. First, scientists take a sample of all the genetic material, or DNA, in a specific environment (1). Then, the double-stranded DNA is split into its single strands and chopped into hundreds of small pieces (2), a process that makes the DNA length manageable for computers to read. Finally, after the sequence is read, the computer finds overlapping DNA sequences (3) to stitch back together and reveal the entire DNA sequence (4).