Yang Xuanyi, Wang Xiaochen, Zhang Mingyi, Shen Ying, Teng Yang, Li Ming, Pan Huijuan
School of Ecology and Nature Conservation, Beijing Forestry University, Beijing, China.
CAS Key Laboratory of Animal Ecology and Conservation Biology, Institute of Zoology, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Beijing, China.
Integr Zool. 2025 Sep;20(5):936-947. doi: 10.1111/1749-4877.12932. Epub 2024 Dec 17.
Gut mycobiota are part of the gut microbiome, typically derived from the host diet and living environment. In this study, we examined the gut mycobiota of three snub-nosed monkeys: Rhinopithecus roxellana, R. bieti, and R. strykeri using next-generation amplicon sequencing targeting the fungal internal transcribed spacer. The alpha diversity indexes of gut mycobiota in R. bieti were significantly higher than R. roxellana and R. strykeri, the beta diversity indicated that R. roxellana and R. bieti had more similar feeding habits. Core mycobiota demonstrated commonalities among the three species and potentially associated with feeding habits. Mycobiota displaying significant differences exhibited the respective characteristics of the host, likely associated with the hosts' living environment. Among them, animal and plant pathogenic fungi and lichen parasites are potential threats to the survival of snub-nosed monkeys for their pathogenicity to both monkeys and their food plants. Functionally, fungal trophic modes and functional guilds revealed a strong association between gut mycobiota and host diet. We found a higher abundance and more significant correlations with lichen parasitic fungi in R. strykeri than the other two species, indicating potential threats to their foods. Accordingly, this study revealed the basic structures of gut mycobiota of three wild Rhinopithecus species and highlighted the associations between gut mycobiota and their feeding habits and living environments. Furthermore, due to the close connection between fungi and the environment, animals could ingest fungi from their diet; thus, we speculate that gut mycobiota may serve a role in environmental monitoring for wildlife.
肠道真菌群是肠道微生物群的一部分，通常源自宿主的饮食和生活环境。在本研究中，我们使用靶向真菌内部转录间隔区的新一代扩增子测序技术，检测了三种仰鼻猴（川金丝猴、滇金丝猴和怒江金丝猴）的肠道真菌群。滇金丝猴肠道真菌群的α多样性指数显著高于川金丝猴和怒江金丝猴，β多样性表明川金丝猴和滇金丝猴的饮食习惯更为相似。核心真菌群在这三个物种中表现出共性，并且可能与饮食习惯有关。表现出显著差异的真菌群展现出宿主各自的特征，可能与宿主的生活环境有关。其中，动植物致病真菌和地衣寄生虫因其对猴子及其食用植物的致病性，对仰鼻猴的生存构成潜在威胁。在功能方面，真菌营养模式和功能类群揭示了肠道真菌群与宿主饮食之间的紧密关联。我们发现，怒江金丝猴中地衣寄生真菌的丰度更高，且与其他两个物种相比具有更显著的相关性，这表明对其食物存在潜在威胁。因此，本研究揭示了三种野生仰鼻猴肠道真菌群的基本结构，并突出了肠道真菌群与其饮食习惯和生活环境之间的关联。此外，由于真菌与环境之间的紧密联系，动物可以从饮食中摄取真菌；因此，我们推测肠道真菌群可能在野生动物的环境监测中发挥作用。
