Microbes are mediators in almost all ecosystem processes and act as a pivotal game changer in various ecological activities, globally. Therefore, understanding of microbial community structure and related functions in different environmental and micro-environmental niches is not only critical, but also a matter of greatest importance. Due to our inability to cultivate and preserve all sorts of microorganisms, we are losing some ecologically and industrially relevant components of microbial community, due to extinction caused by environmental and climatic variations with time. Intact sample and microbiome preservation are crucial for future cultivation as well as to study the effects of ecological and climatic variations on community functionality and shift with time, using OMICS. Although, methods for pure culture preservation are almost optimized, the techniques of microbiome preservation still remain as an unsolved challenge for microbiologists due to technical and physiological constraints. Present article discusses, recent approaches of microbial preservation with special reference to intact sample, mixed culture and microbiome preservation. It also incorporates recent practices used to achieve the highest viability and metabolic activities in long-term preserved microbiome.

中文翻译：

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微生物和微生物组保存的最新概述。

微生物是几乎所有生态系统过程中的媒介，并在全球各种生态活动中扮演着关键的游戏规则改变者的角色。因此，了解不同环境和微环境生态位中的微生物群落结构和相关功能不仅至关重要，而且是最重要的问题。由于我们无法培养和保存各种微生物，由于环境和气候随时间的变化导致灭绝，我们正在失去微生物群落的一些生态和工业相关成分。完整的样本和微生物组保存对于未来的培养以及使用 OMICS 研究生态和气候变化对群落功能和随时间变化的影响至关重要。虽然，纯培养保存的方法几乎是优化的，由于技术和生理限制，微生物组保存技术仍然是微生物学家尚未解决的挑战。本文讨论了微生物保存的最新方法，特别是完整样本、混合培养和微生物组保存。它还结合了最近用于在长期保存的微生物组中实现最高活力和代谢活动的实践。