Developmental stage variation in the gut microbiome of South China tigers

Abstract

South China tigers (Panthera tigris amoyensis, SC) are the most threatened tiger subspecies in the world. All the living SCs are captive in zoos or reserves and depend on artificial feeding. The composition of the gut microbiome plays an important role in sustaining the health of the host. A comprehensive understanding of the composition and development of the microbial community of SC is helpful to improve the feeding of captive SC. In this study, we collected 47 fecal samples, 37 of which were from SC of three developmental stages, 5 from adult Amur tigers (Am), and 5 from adult Bengal tigers (Bg), which were all housed in the same zoo. We investigated the diversity, richness, and composition of the bacterial microbiomes and we found that the gut microbiome of SC is strongly affected by host aging. The composition of the gut microbiome of juvenile SC experienced dramatic changes from 5 months old to 1 year old, and it showed much less difference when compared to the samples of 1 year old and the subadult. No significant differences were observed between the samples of subadult and the adult groups. The predominant phylum of 5-month-old SC is Fusobacteriota (33.99%) when the juvenile tigers were older than 5 months, and Firmicutes, but not Fusobacteriota, became the predominant phylum of bacteria in their gut. The gut microbiome of SC, Am, and Bg is possibly affected by their genetic variation; however, the core microbiome of these three subspecies is the same. Our data suggest that the gut microbiome of SC undergoes a developmental progression: a developmental phase (cub), a transitional phase (subadult), and a stable phase (adult). These results expand our understanding of the role of age in the development of the gut microbiome of SC.

High-Throughput Sequencing Reveals a Dynamic Bacterial Linkage between the Captive White Rhinoceros and Its Environment

“…Previous study showed that the developing gut microbiome of humans from infancy to childhood undergoes three distinct phases of microbiome progression ( 40 ); the composition and function of the human gut microbiota change with aging, which in turn affects human health ( 22 ). A study of tigers also found that the composition of gut microbiome undergoes significant changes with age, which could be divided into three distinct phases ( 41 ). In this study, we found that the beta diversity of the gut and skin samples of the young and older white rhinoceroses both showed a significant difference, respectively.…”

The study on the impact of sex on the structure of gut microbiota of bamboo rats in China

“…Alpha diversity was applied to analyze the complexity of the diversity of the sample of four indices, including Simpson, ACE, Chao 1, and Shannon. We conducted statistical tests of ANOVA, and Tukey HSD was used to test the statistical significance of alpha diversity indices and to confirm the significance of the two groups (Zhang et al, 2022 ). For beta diversity, principal coordinates analysis (PCoA) based on unweighted and weighted UniFrac distances (Lozupone and Knight, 2015 ) was applied to compare the gut bacterial community between male and female bamboo rats.…”

What Can the Gut Microbiota of Animals Teach Us about the Relationship between Nutrition and Burden of Lifestyle Diseases?

“…The ratio of Firmicutes to Bacteroides increases between the cub and adult stages. While there are no discernible differences in the alpha diversity of the gut microbiome among juvenile, subadult, and adult South China tigers, it has been suggested that the richness and evenness of their gut microbiome may gradually increase with age [ 78 ]. Conversely, Zhu et al [ 79 ] reported that microbial diversity and richness decrease with age in captive Amur tigers.…”