Conservation Genetic Research Unit, Research and Innovation Centre, Fondazione Edmund Mach, S. Michele All'Adige, Italy.
Department of Biology, University of Florence, Sesto Fiorentino, Italy.
Sci Rep. 2021 Nov 3;11(1):21569. doi: 10.1038/s41598-021-01145-1.
The mammalian gastrointestinal tract harbours a highly complex ecosystem composed of a variety of micro- (bacteria, fungi, viruses, protozoans) and macro-organisms (helminths). Although most microbiota research focuses on the variation of single gut components, the crosstalk between components is still poorly characterized, especially in hosts living under natural conditions. We investigated the gut micro-biodiversity (bacteria, fungi and helminths) of 158 individuals of two wild non-human primates, the Udzungwa red colobus (Procolobus gordonorum) and the yellow baboon (Papio cynocephalus). These species have contrasting diets and lifestyles, but live sympatrically in both human-impacted and pristine forests in the Udzungwa Mountains of Tanzania. Using non-invasive faecal pellets, helminths were identified using standard microscopy while bacteria and fungi were characterized by sequencing the V1-V3 variable region of the 16S rRNA gene for bacteria and the ITS1-ITS2 fragment for fungi. Our results show that both diversity and composition of bacteria and fungi are associated with variation in helminth presence. Although interactions differed by habitat type, in both primates we found that Strongyloides was negatively associated and Trichuris was positively associated with bacterial and fungal richness. To our knowledge, this is one of the few studies demonstrating an interaction between helminth and gut microbiota communities in wild non-human primates.
哺乳动物的胃肠道中栖息着一个高度复杂的生态系统，由各种微生物（细菌、真菌、病毒、原生动物）和大型生物（寄生虫）组成。尽管大多数微生物组研究都集中在单个肠道成分的变化上，但各成分之间的相互作用仍未得到充分描述，尤其是在生活在自然条件下的宿主中。我们调查了坦桑尼亚乌宗圭山脉中两种野生非人类灵长类动物——红疣猴（Procolobus gordonorum）和黄狒狒（Papio cynocephalus）的肠道微生物多样性（细菌、真菌和寄生虫）。这两个物种的饮食和生活方式截然不同，但在人类活动影响和原始森林中都有共生。我们使用非侵入性的粪便样本，通过标准显微镜鉴定寄生虫，同时通过测序细菌 16S rRNA 基因的 V1-V3 可变区和真菌的 ITS1-ITS2 片段来描述细菌和真菌的特征。我们的结果表明，细菌和真菌的多样性和组成都与寄生虫的存在有关。尽管交互作用因栖息地类型而异，但在这两种灵长类动物中，我们发现钩虫与细菌和真菌丰富度呈负相关，而鞭虫与细菌和真菌丰富度呈正相关。据我们所知，这是少数几项证明野生非人类灵长类动物中寄生虫和肠道微生物群落之间存在相互作用的研究之一。
