Cloacal microbiota are biogeographically structured in larks from desert, tropical and temperate areas
Metadatos
Mostrar el registro completo del ítemEditorial
BMC
Materia
Alaudidae Avian microbiota Cloacal microbiota Host-microbiome Microbial biogeography
Fecha
2023-02-11Referencia bibliográfica
van Veelen, H.P.J... [et al.]. Cloacal microbiota are biogeographically structured in larks from desert, tropical and temperate areas. BMC Microbiol 23, 40 (2023). [https://doi.org/10.1186/s12866-023-02768-2]
Patrocinador
Schure-Beijerinck-Poppings Fonds Netherlands Organization for Scientific Research (NWO) 864.10.012Resumen
Background In contrast with macroorganisms, that show well-documented biogeographical patterns in distribution
associated with local adaptation of physiology, behavior and life history, strong biogeographical patterns have not
been found for microorganisms, raising questions about what determines their biogeography. Thus far, large-scale
biogeographical studies have focused on free-living microbes, paying little attention to host-associated microbes,
which play essential roles in physiology, behavior and life history of their hosts. Investigating cloacal gut microbiota
of closely-related, ecologically similar free-living songbird species (Alaudidae, larks) inhabiting desert, temperate and
tropical regions, we explored influences of geographical location and host species on α-diversity, co-occurrence of
amplicon sequence variants (ASVs) and genera, differentially abundant and dominant bacterial taxa, and community
composition. We also investigated how geographical distance explained differences in gut microbial community
composition among larks.
Results Geographic location did not explain variation in richness and Shannon diversity of cloacal microbiota in
larks. Out of 3798 ASVs and 799 bacterial genera identified, 17 ASVs (< 0.5%) and 43 genera (5%) were shared by larks
from all locations. Desert larks held fewer unique ASVs (25%) than temperate zone (31%) and tropical larks (34%). Five
out of 33 detected bacterial phyla dominated lark cloacal gut microbiomes. In tropical larks three bacterial classes
were overrepresented. Highlighting the distinctiveness of desert lark microbiota, the relative abundances of 52 ASVs
differed among locations, which classified within three dominant and 11 low-abundance phyla. Clear and significant
phylogenetic clustering in cloacal microbiota community composition (unweighted UniFrac) showed segregation
with geography and host species, where microbiota of desert larks were distinct from those of tropical and temperate
regions. Geographic distance was nonlinearly associated with pairwise unweighted UniFrac distances.
Conclusions We conclude that host-associated microbiota are geographically structured in a group of widespread
but closely-related bird species, following large-scale macro-ecological patterns and contrasting with previous
findings for free-living microbes. Future work should further explore if and to what extent geographic variation in
host-associated microbiota can be explained as result of co-evolution between gut microbes and host adaptive traits, and if and how acquisition from the environmental pool of bacteria contributes to explaining host-associated
communities.