Effects of infection and colonization on the zebrafish intestinal microbiome Open Access

Abstract

Zebrafish (Danio rerio) are an attractive model organism for a variety of scientific studies, including host-microbe interactions. Zebrafish contain a core (i.e., consistently detected) intestinal microbiome consisting primarily of Proteobacteria. Furthermore, this core intestinal microbiome is plastic, and can be significantly altered to due external factors. The organism is particularly useful for the study of aquatic microbes that can colonize vertebrate hosts, including . As an intestinal pathogen, needs to colonize the intestine of an exposed host for any type of pathogenicity to occur. It is suspected that members of the resident intestinal microbial community need to be eliminated by in order for colonization, and subsequently disease, to occur. While numerous studies have explored various aspects of the pathogenic effects of on zebrafish and other model organisms, few, if any, have examined how a infection alters the resident intestinal community. In this study, 16S rRNA gene sequencing was utilized to investigate how various strains of alter the aforementioned microbial profiles following an infection. We found that infection and subsequent colonization induced significant changes in the zebrafish intestinal microbiome, with specific members of the microbial community targeted. Additional salient differences to the microbial profile were observed based on the particular strain of utilized for challenging the zebrafish hosts. We conclude that causes significant modulation to the zebrafish intestinal microbiome in order for infection and subsequent disease to occur.

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/content/journal/acmi/10.1099/acmi.ac2020.po0023
2020-07-10
2024-03-29
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http://instance.metastore.ingenta.com/content/journal/acmi/10.1099/acmi.ac2020.po0023
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