Bacterial microbiota composition of Ixodes ricinus ticks: the role of environmental variation, tick characteristics and microbial interactions
Aivelo, T; Norberg, A; Tschirren, B
Date: 19 December 2019
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PeerJ
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PeerJ
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Abstract
Ecological factors, host characteristics and/or interactions among microbes may all
shape the occurrence of microbes and the structure of microbial communities within
organisms. In the past, disentangling these factors and determining their relative
importance in shaping within-host microbiota communities has been hampered by
analytical ...
Ecological factors, host characteristics and/or interactions among microbes may all
shape the occurrence of microbes and the structure of microbial communities within
organisms. In the past, disentangling these factors and determining their relative
importance in shaping within-host microbiota communities has been hampered by
analytical limitations to account for (dis)similar environmental preferences (`environmental
filtering'). Here we used a joint species distribution modelling (JSDM)
approach to characterize the bacterial microbiota of one of the most important disease
vectors in Europe, the sheep tick Ixodes ricinus, along ecological gradients in the
Swiss Alps. Although our study captured extensive environmental variation along
elevational clines, the explanatory power of such large-scale ecological factors was
comparably weak, suggesting that tick-specific traits and behaviours, microhabitat and
-climate experienced by ticks, and interactions among microbes play an important
role in shaping tick microbial communities. Indeed, when accounting for shared
environmental preferences, evidence for significant patterns of positive or negative
co-occurrence among microbes was found, which is indicative of competition or
facilitation processes. Signals of facilitation were observed primarily among human
pathogens, leading to co-infection within ticks, whereas signals of competition were
observed between the tick endosymbiont Spiroplasma and human pathogens. These
findings highlight the important role of small-scale ecological variation and microbemicrobe
interactions in shaping tick microbial communities and the dynamics of tickborne
disease.
Biosciences - old structure
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Except where otherwise noted, this item's licence is described as © 2019 Aivelo et al. Distributed under Creative Commons CC-BY 4.0.