Seasonal diet and microbiome shifts in wild rhesus macaques occupying marginal high-latitude habitats are correlated at the level of non-protein diet component.

It is now generally accepted that the microbial community of the animal gut (henceforth gut microbiome) profoundly influences many aspects of animal physiology and well-being. This occurs through diverse mechanisms that include microbe contributions to nutrition and to modulation of neuroendocrine and immune signaling in both postnatal development and physiological regulation. The range of known or postulated microbiome impacts in humans and other animals encompasses so many aspects of behavior, physiology and development that we might expect stability of the host-microbiome relationship to be a significant factor for ecological fitness of most mammals . Thus, understanding how the population structure (and function) of an animal microbial community responds to variation in the environment, and how this response varies between individuals of the same species, is fundamental to understanding animal biology . We may also expect this to give insights into the public health and epidemiology associated with nutritional change in humans .