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Houseflies harbor less diverse microbiota under laboratory conditions but maintain a consistent set of host-associated bacteria.

ABSTRACT: The housefly (Musca domestica) is a wide-ranging insect, often associated with decaying matter from livestock and humans. The septic environments in which houseflies live are believed to be a rich source for microbial acquisition. Although the housefly can harbor a wide range of microorganisms, it is not yet well known which microbes are always recurrent, which are dispensable and which environmentally dependent. In the present study, we aim at identifying which microbes are recurrently associated with the housefly gut throughout the species' life cycle and whether their acquisition relies on the fly's living environment. We surveyed three housefly strains-two of them kept under standard laboratory conditions for a long time and one wild-caught. To track any shifts happening throughout the lifecycle of the housefly and to test the consistency of the revealed microbial communities, we sampled houseflies at five developmental stages over the course of four consecutive generations. Both the bacterial and fungal microbiota of five developmental stages were studied for all samples, using amplicon sequencing for the 16S and ITS1 rRNA gene, respectively. Results revealed diverse microbial communities yet consistent for each of the two distinct sampling environments. The wild-caught population showed a more diverse and more distinct gut microbiota than the two laboratory strains, even though the strain was phylogenetically similar and shared geographic origin with one of them. Two bacterial genera, Myroides and Providencia, and two yeasts, Trichosporon and Candida tropicalis, were present in all sampled larvae and pupae, regardless of the strain. Analysis of the provided diet revealed that the flies acquired the yeasts through feeding. Our main findings show that houseflies might lose microbial diversity when reared in controlled environments, however they can maintain a consistent set of bacteria. We conclude that although the environment can facilitate certain microbial transmission routes for the housefly, and despite the fungal microbiota being largely acquired through diet, the larval bacterial gut microbiome remains relatively consistent within the same developmental stage.

SUBMITTER: Voulgari-Kokota A

PROVIDER: S-EPMC9249849 | biostudies-literature |

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature

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Project description:The family Cactaceae comprises a diverse group of typically succulent plants that are native to the American continent but have been introduced to nearly all other continents, predominantly for ornamental purposes. Despite their economic, cultural, and ecological importance, very little research has been conducted on the viral community that infects them. We previously identified a highly divergent geminivirus that is the first known to infect cacti. Recent research efforts in non-cultivated and asymptomatic plants have shown that the diversity of this viral family has been under-sampled. As a consequence, little is known about the effects and interactions of geminiviruses in many plants, such as cacti. With the objective to expand knowledge on the diversity of geminiviruses infecting cacti, we used previously acquired high-throughput sequencing results to search for viral sequences using BLASTx against a viral RefSeq protein database. We identified two additional sequences with similarity to geminiviruses, for which we designed abutting primers and recovered full-length genomes. From 42 cacti and five scale insects, we derived 42 complete genome sequences of a novel geminivirus species that we have tentatively named Opuntia virus 2 (OpV2) and 32 genomes of an Opuntia-infecting becurtovirus (which is a new strain of the spinach curly top Arizona virus species). Interspecies recombination analysis of the OpV2 group revealed several recombinant regions, in some cases spanning half of the genome. Phylogenetic analysis demonstrated that OpV2 is a novel geminivirus more closely related to viruses of the genus Curtovirus, which was further supported by the detection of three recombination events between curtoviruses and OpV2. Both OpV2 and Opuntia becurtoviruses were identified in mixed infections, which also included the previously characterized Opuntia virus 1. Viral quantification of the co-infected cactus plants compared with single infections did not show any clear trend in viral dynamics that might be associated with the mixed infections. Using experimental Rhizobium-mediated inoculations, we found that the initial accumulation of OpV2 is facilitated by co-infection with OpV1. This study shows that the diversity of geminiviruses that infect cacti is under-sampled and that cacti harbor diverse geminiviruses. The detection of the Opuntia becurtoviruses suggests spill-over events between viruses of cultivated species and native vegetation. The threat this poses to cacti needs to be further investigated.

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Houseflies harbor less diverse microbiota under laboratory conditions but maintain a consistent set of host-associated bacteria.

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