microbetag: simplifying microbial network interpretation through annotation, enrichment tests and metabolic complementarity analysis

Microbial co-occurrence network inference is often hindered by low accuracy and tool dependency. We introduce microbetag, a comprehensive software ecosystem designed to enhance network annotation. Nodes (taxa) are enriched with phenotypic traits, while edges represent metabolic complementarities, highlighting potential cross-feeding relationships. microbetag's online version relies on microbetagDB, a database of 34,608 high-quality genomes with detailed annotations. A stand-alone tool allows users to apply microbetag to custom reference genomes/bins/MAGs. Additionally, MGG, a CytoscapeApp, offers a streamlined, user-friendly interface for network retrieval and visualization. microbetag effectively identified known metabolic interactions and serves as a robust hypothesis-generating tool.