Before revision:  The results reveal a  niche space with continuous branching geometry, whose branches correspond to adaptations to habitats , hosts, and unique resource use strategies. This provides a new perspective on the functional capabilities of known bacteria and lays an ecological foundation for the study of microbiomes . The variables defined here constitute a new way to classify and systematise bacterial populations in ecological terms . We regard this as an important step in the quest to bring methods and results from ecology to bear on microbial communities .
After revision:  The results reveal a niche space with continuous branching geometry, whose branches constitute major strategies spanning life in different habitats and hosts. We further demonstrate that communities from similar ecosystem types map to characteristic regions of this new functional coordinate system, permitting ecological descriptions of microbiomes in terms of large scale metabolic roles that may be filled .