Gut microbiomes of wild great apes fluctuate seasonally in response to diet

Allison L. Hicks, Kerry Jo Lee, Mara Couto-Rodriguez, Juber Patel, Rohini Sinha, Cheng Guo, Sarah H. Olson, Anton Seimon, Tracie A. Seimon, Alain U. Ondzie, William B. Karesh, Patricia Reed, Kenneth N. Cameron, W. Ian Lipkin and Brent L. Williams ()
Additional contact information
Allison L. Hicks: Columbia University
Kerry Jo Lee: Columbia University
Mara Couto-Rodriguez: Columbia University
Juber Patel: Columbia University
Rohini Sinha: Columbia University
Cheng Guo: Columbia University
Sarah H. Olson: Wildlife Health Program
Anton Seimon: Appalachian State University
Tracie A. Seimon: Columbia University
Alain U. Ondzie: Wildlife Health Program
William B. Karesh: Global Health Program
Patricia Reed: Wildlife Health Program
Kenneth N. Cameron: Wildlife Health Program
W. Ian Lipkin: Columbia University
Brent L. Williams: Columbia University

Nature Communications, 2018, vol. 9, issue 1, 1-18

Abstract: Abstract The microbiome is essential for extraction of energy and nutrition from plant-based diets and may have facilitated primate adaptation to new dietary niches in response to rapid environmental shifts. Here we use 16S rRNA sequencing to characterize the microbiota of wild western lowland gorillas and sympatric central chimpanzees and demonstrate compositional divergence between the microbiotas of gorillas, chimpanzees, Old World monkeys, and modern humans. We show that gorilla and chimpanzee microbiomes fluctuate with seasonal rainfall patterns and frugivory. Metagenomic sequencing of gorilla microbiomes demonstrates distinctions in functional metabolic pathways, archaea, and dietary plants among enterotypes, suggesting that dietary seasonality dictates shifts in the microbiome and its capacity for microbial plant fiber digestion versus growth on mucus glycans. These data indicate that great ape microbiomes are malleable in response to dietary shifts, suggesting a role for microbiome plasticity in driving dietary flexibility, which may provide fundamental insights into the mechanisms by which diet has driven the evolution of human gut microbiomes.

Date: 2018
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DOI: 10.1038/s41467-018-04204-w

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