Low-level environmental metal pollution is associated with altered gut microbiota of a wild rodent, the bank vole (Myodes glareolus)

Mining and related industries are a major source of metal pollution. As the gut microbiota is a key component of host health, we used 16S rRNA amplicon sequencing to determine whether multi-metal exposure (the sum of normalized levels of fifteen metals) was associated with changes in the gut microbiota of wild bank voles (Myodes glareolus) from two locations in Finland. Using these data we found that exposure to increased metal load is associated with higher gut microbiota species diversity (a-diversity) and changes in community composition (B-diversity). Our data indicate that even low-level metal pollution can affect the diversity of microbiota and be associated with deterministic changes in the composition of host gut microbiota in wild animal populations.