Seasonal and ontogenetic variation of skin microbial communities and relationships to natural disease dynamics in declining amphibians

Recently, microbiologists have focused on characterizing the probiotic role of skin bacteria for amphibians threatened by the fungal disease chytridiomycosis. However, the specific characteristics of microbial diversity required to maintain health or trigger disease are still not well understood in natural populations. We hypothesized that seasonal and developmental transitions affecting susceptibility to chytridiomycosis could also alter the stability of microbial assemblages. To test our hypothesis, we examined patterns of skin bacterial diversity in two species of declining amphibians (Lithobates yavapaiensis and Eleutherodactylus coqui) affected by the pathogenic fungus Batrachochytrium dendrobatidis (Bd). We focused on two important transitions that affect Bd susceptibility: ontogenetic (from juvenile to adult) shifts in E. coqui and seasonal (from summer to winter) shifts in L. yavapaiensis. We used a combination of community-fingerprinting analyses and 16S rRNA amplicon sequencin...

近年来，微生物学家聚焦于解析受真菌病壶菌病（chytridiomycosis）威胁的两栖动物皮肤细菌的益生功能。然而，目前针对自然种群中维持宿主健康或诱发疾病所需的微生物多样性具体特征，仍未得到充分阐释。我们提出假说：影响两栖动物对壶菌病易感性的季节与发育转变，同样可改变其皮肤微生物群落的稳定性。为验证该假说，我们针对两种受病原真菌蛙壶菌（Batrachochytrium dendrobatidis，简称Bd）侵染的种群衰退型两栖动物——雅瓦派林蛙（Lithobates yavapaiensis）与科奎树蛙（Eleutherodactylus coqui）——的皮肤细菌多样性模式开展研究。本研究重点关注两类影响病原真菌易感性的关键转变：科奎树蛙的个体发育转变（幼体至成体阶段），以及雅瓦派林蛙的季节转变（夏季至冬季）。本研究结合群落指纹分析与16S rRNA扩增子测序……