Culture-independent method for screening and identifying microbial enzyme-encoding genes using microdroplet-based single cell genomics

Environmental microbes are a great source of industrially valuable enzymes with high and unique catalytic activities. However, a vast majority of microbes remain unculturable and thus are not accessible by culture-based methods. Here, we present a rapid and efficient method to screen and identify enzyme-encoding genes from environmental microbes in a culture-independent manner. This method combines activity-based single cell screening using microdroplets and single cell genomics. Using this method, we successfully identified 13 novel β-glucosidase genes from uncultured marine bacteria. This method will facilitate the identification of genes encoding industrially valuable enzymes.