ABSTRACT
References...................................................................................................... 51
The assessment of diversity within microbial communities is one of the most
challenging and fascinating aspects of microbiology, especially in light of the
fact that we know so little about it. This is reflected by estimates of the number
of bacterial species that exist on Earth today, which vary between 10
and 10
.
There is a substantial amount of literature dealing with biodiversity, but most
of it focuses on plants and animals, and the number of prokaryotic species
that have been described so far is remarkably low when compared to
eukaryotic ones.
