Journal
PROCEEDINGS OF THE ROYAL SOCIETY B-BIOLOGICAL SCIENCES
Volume 287, Issue 1920, Pages -Publisher
ROYAL SOC
DOI: 10.1098/rspb.2019.2182
Keywords
microbiome; Passer domesticus; 16S metabarcoding; cloaca; bacterial communities; plasticity
Categories
Funding
- Interuniversity Attraction Poles Programme Phase VII by the Belgian Science Policy Office [P07/4]
- French Laboratory of Excellence project 'Tulip' [ANR-10-LABX-41, ANR-11-IDEX-0002-02]
Ask authors/readers for more resources
Urban sprawl increasingly affects the ecology of natural populations, including host-microbiota interactions, with observed differences in the gut microbiota between urban and rural hosts. While different mechanisms could explain this pattern, dietary uptake constitutes a likely candidate. To assess the contribution of diet in explaining urban-rural variation in gut microbiota, we performed an aviary experiment in which urban and rural house sparrows were fed with mimics of urban or rural diets. Before the experiment, rural sparrows hosted more diverse gut communities, with a higher relative abundance of Enterococcaceae and Staphylococcaceae and lower abundance of genes involved in xenobiotic degradation and lipid metabolism than their urban counterparts. The experimental diets significantly altered gut microbiota alpha- and beta-diversity and taxonomic composition, with the strongest shifts occurring in individuals exposed to contrasting diets. Overall, diet-induced shifts resembled initial differences between free-ranging urban and rural hosts. Furthermore, rural diet had a positive impact on urban host body mass but only in hosts with the highest initial gut diversity. Overall, our results indicate that diet constitutes an important factor contributing to differences in gut microbiota along the urbanization gradient and provide new insights on possible fitness consequences of a reduced gut diversity in urban settings.
Authors
I am an author on this paper
Click your name to claim this paper and add it to your profile.
Reviews
Recommended
No Data Available