Abstract: To understand the bacterial flora structure and microbial safety of red sufu as a traditional Chinese fermented food, the V1-V3 region of the bacterial 16S rDNA from red sufus produced in the east, north and northeast of the country was sequenced by high-throughput sequencing and the differences in the structure and diversity of microbial community was analyzed among these samples. The results showed that the sequencing depth effectively covered the microbial species in the samples, and the bacterial communities in them were rich and diverse. At the phylum level, Firmicutes, Actinobacteria and Proteobacteria were dominant in all samples. A total of 296 bacterial genera were detected, with Corynebacterium, Tetragenococcus, Leuconostoc, Rummeliibacillus, Lactococcus, Weissella, Streptococcus, Comamonas, Bacillus and Trabulsiella being common to these samples. At the same time, clustering analysis demonstrated that there was a relationship between the bacterial community structure and the geographical origin of red sufu. The main dominant bacteria in the samples from North China were Candida, Lactobacillus and Tetraphylococcus, while those in the red sufu samples from Northeast China were Bacillus and Halanaerobe. This study gives further insights into the structure and diversity of microbial community in red sufu, providing a theoretical basis for production of traditional fermented foods with higher quality and safety.

Key words: high-throughput sequencing, red sufu, bacterial diversity