Tola Yosef Hamba, Waweru Jacqueline Wahura, Hurst Gregory D D, Slippers Bernard, Paredes Juan C
International Centre of Insect Physiology and Ecology (icipe), Nairobi 30772-00100, Kenya.
Department of Biochemistry, Genetics and Microbiology, Forestry and Agricultural Biotechnology Institute (FABI), University of Pretoria, Pretoria 0002, South Africa.
Microorganisms. 2020 Nov 3;8(11):1721. doi: 10.3390/microorganisms8111721.
Gut microbiota plays important roles in many physiological processes of the host including digestion, protection, detoxification, and development of immune responses. The honey bee () has emerged as model for gut-microbiota host interaction studies due to its gut microbiota being highly conserved and having a simple composition. A key gap in this model is understanding how the microbiome differs regionally, including sampling from the tropics and in particular from Africa. The African region is important from the perspective of the native diversity of the bees, and differences in landscape and bee management. Here, we characterized the honey bee gut microbiota in sub-Saharan Africa using 16S rRNA amplicon sequencing. We confirm the presence of the core gut microbiota members and highlight different compositions of these communities across regions. We found that bees from the coastal regions harbor a higher relative abundance and diversity on core members. Additionally, we showed that and dominate in all locations, and that altitude and humidity affect abundance. In contrast, we found that was less common compared temperate regions of the world. This study is a first comprehensive characterization of the gut microbiota of honey bees from sub-Saharan Africa and underscores the need to study microbiome diversity in other indigenous bee species and regions.
肠道微生物群在宿主的许多生理过程中发挥着重要作用，包括消化、保护、解毒以及免疫反应的发育。蜜蜂因其肠道微生物群高度保守且组成简单，已成为肠道微生物群与宿主相互作用研究的模型。该模型的一个关键空白在于了解微生物群在区域上的差异，包括从热带地区尤其是非洲进行采样。从蜜蜂的原生多样性、景观和蜜蜂管理的差异来看，非洲地区很重要。在这里，我们使用16S rRNA扩增子测序对撒哈拉以南非洲地区的蜜蜂肠道微生物群进行了特征分析。我们证实了核心肠道微生物群成员的存在，并强调了这些群落跨区域的不同组成。我们发现，来自沿海地区的蜜蜂核心成员的相对丰度和多样性更高。此外，我们表明 和 在所有地点都占主导地位，并且海拔和湿度会影响 的丰度。相比之下，我们发现 与世界温带地区相比不太常见。这项研究首次全面描述了撒哈拉以南非洲地区蜜蜂的肠道微生物群，并强调了研究其他本土蜜蜂物种和地区微生物群多样性的必要性。
