Liu Wenzheng, Russel Jakob, Røder Henriette L, Madsen Jonas S, Burmølle Mette, Sørensen Søren J
Department of Biology, University of Copenhagen, 2100 Copenhagen Ø, Denmark.
Environ Microbiol. 2017 Jul;19(7):2893-2905. doi: 10.1111/1462-2920.13816. Epub 2017 Jul 3.
Microorganisms frequently co-exist in matrix-embedded multispecies biofilms. Within biofilms, interspecies interactions influence the spatial organization of member species, which likely play an important role in shaping the development, structure and function of these communities. Here, a reproducible four-species biofilm, composed of Stenotrophomonas rhizophila, Xanthomonas retroflexus, Microbacterium oxydans and Paenibacillus amylolyticus, was established to study the importance of individual species spatial organization during multispecies biofilm development. We found that the growth of species that are poor biofilm formers, M. oxydans and P. amylolyticus, were highly enhanced when residing in the four-species biofilm. Interestingly, the presence of the low-abundant M. oxydans (0.5% of biomass volume) was observed to trigger changes in the composition of the four-species community. The other three species were crucially needed for the successful inclusion of M. oxydans in the four-species biofilm, where X. retroflexus was consistently positioned in the top layer of the mature four-species biofilm. These findings suggest that low abundance key species can significantly impact the spatial organization and hereby stabilize the function and composition of complex microbiomes.
微生物常常在嵌入基质的多物种生物膜中共存。在生物膜内，种间相互作用影响成员物种的空间组织，这可能在塑造这些群落的发育、结构和功能方面发挥重要作用。在此，建立了一种由嗜根寡养单胞菌、弯曲黄单胞菌、氧化微杆菌和解淀粉芽孢杆菌组成的可重复的四物种生物膜，以研究多物种生物膜发育过程中单个物种空间组织的重要性。我们发现，生物膜形成能力较差的氧化微杆菌和解淀粉芽孢杆菌，在四物种生物膜中生长时，其生长得到了显著增强。有趣的是，观察到低丰度的氧化微杆菌（占生物量体积的0.5%）的存在会引发四物种群落组成的变化。氧化微杆菌成功纳入四物种生物膜至关重要地需要其他三个物种，其中弯曲黄单胞菌始终位于成熟四物种生物膜的顶层。这些发现表明，低丰度关键物种可显著影响空间组织，从而稳定复杂微生物群落的功能和组成。
