Department of Biological Sciences, Virginia Polytechnic Institute and State University (Virginia Tech), Blacksburg, Virginia, United States.
Department of Statistics, Virginia Polytechnic Institute and State University (Virginia Tech), Blacksburg, Virginia, United States.
PeerJ. 2023 Jul 14;11:e15556. doi: 10.7717/peerj.15556. eCollection 2023.
Skin microbial communities are an essential part of host health and can play a role in mitigating disease. Host and environmental factors can shape and alter these microbial communities and, therefore, we need to understand to what extent these factors influence microbial communities and how this can impact disease dynamics. Microbial communities have been studied in amphibian systems due to skin microbial communities providing some resistance to the amphibian chytrid fungus, . However, we are only starting to understand how host and environmental factors shape these communities for amphibians. In this study, we examined whether amphibian skin bacterial communities differ among host species, host infection status, host developmental stage, and host habitat. We collected skin swabs from tadpoles and adults of three Ranid frog species ( spp.) at the Mianus River Gorge Preserve in Bedford, New York, USA, and used 16S rRNA gene amplicon sequencing to determine bacterial community composition. Our analysis suggests amphibian skin bacterial communities change across host developmental stages, as has been documented previously. Additionally, we found that skin bacterial communities differed among Ranid species, with skin communities on the host species captured in streams or bogs differing from the communities of the species captured on land. Thus, habitat use of different species may drive differences in host-associated microbial communities for closely-related host species.
皮肤微生物群落是宿主健康的重要组成部分，可在减轻疾病方面发挥作用。宿主和环境因素可以塑造和改变这些微生物群落，因此，我们需要了解这些因素在多大程度上影响微生物群落，以及这如何影响疾病动态。由于皮肤微生物群落对两栖动物的粘菌真菌提供了一定的抵抗力，因此在两栖动物系统中研究了微生物群落。然而，我们才刚刚开始了解宿主和环境因素如何塑造这些两栖动物的微生物群落。在这项研究中，我们检查了宿主物种、宿主感染状况、宿主发育阶段和宿主栖息地是否会导致两栖动物皮肤细菌群落存在差异。我们从美国纽约州贝德福德米尼亚斯河峡谷保护区的三种 Ranid 蛙物种（ spp.）的蝌蚪和成蛙中采集了皮肤拭子，并使用 16S rRNA 基因扩增子测序来确定细菌群落组成。我们的分析表明，正如之前所记录的那样，两栖动物皮肤细菌群落随宿主发育阶段而变化。此外，我们发现 Ranid 物种之间的皮肤细菌群落存在差异，在溪流或沼泽中捕获的宿主物种的皮肤群落与在陆地上捕获的物种的群落不同。因此，不同物种的栖息地利用可能会导致密切相关的宿主物种的宿主相关微生物群落存在差异。
