**11. Final comments**

General microbiology techniques have helped to understand the basic dynamic of microbial communities, the diversity of species, the biochemical pathways involved at each phase of the fermentation process, and the metabolic functions of the main spoiling agents involved in degrading the nutritional quality of the silage. NGS helped observe microbial communities, and metabolic profiling does not cease to evolve. This fact directly influences the nutritional characteristics of the silage.

In this chapter, the authors reviewed the main research activities that helped the agricultural industry understand silage, as it is known today and also pointed to experimental techniques that will continue to improve the understanding of metabolic pathways and functional aspects of the ensiling process. It is clear that these techniques will allow the scientific community to discover new inoculants that will combine our knowledge of silage fermentation, understand nutritional quality, improve rumen function, and contribute to better animal health. We are looking forward to the third generation of forage inoculants and seeing their positive impact.

**169**

**Author details**

Pascal Drouin1

\*, Lucas J. Mari<sup>2</sup>

provided the original work is properly cited.

and Renato J. Schmidt1

© 2019 The Author(s). Licensee IntechOpen. This chapter is distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/ by/3.0), which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium,

1 Lallemand Animal Nutrition, Milwaukee, Wisconsin, United States

2 Lallemand Animal Nutrition, Aparecida de Goiânia, Goiás, Brazil

\*Address all correspondence to: pdrouin@lallemand.com

*Lactic Acid Bacteria as Microbial Silage Additives: Current Status and Future Outlook*

*DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.5772/intechopen.89326*

### **Acronyms and abbreviations**


*Lactic Acid Bacteria as Microbial Silage Additives: Current Status and Future Outlook DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.5772/intechopen.89326*
