Resilience of helminth - gut microbiota interactions in a large mammal

We used the horse–cyathostomin system to quantify the resilience of the nematode-bacteria interactions following an anthelmintic treatment. This matched case-control study enrolled 20 healthy and 20 naturally infected horses, whereby half received an anthelmintic drug to remove adult worms from the gut lumen without hampering the development of larval stages. Metabarcoding approaches were implemented to track faecal microbiota and cyathostomin community compositions over a 42-day time-course.

本研究以马-圆线虫（horse–cyathostomin）系统为模型，量化驱虫药（anthelmintic）处理后线虫与细菌互作关系的恢复力。本配对病例对照研究（matched case-control study）共招募20匹健康马及20匹自然感染圆线虫的马，其中半数受试马接受驱虫药物干预，以清除肠道腔中的成虫，且不会干扰幼虫阶段的发育。研究采用元条形码（Metabarcoding）测序技术，对42天时间进程内的粪便微生物群（faecal microbiota）与圆线虫群落组成进行动态追踪分析。