Phylosymbiosis: Relationships and Functional Effects of Microbial Communities across Host Evolutionary History

Phylosymbiosis was recently proposed to describe the eco-evolutionary pattern, whereby the ecological relatedness of host-associated microbial communities parallels the phylogeny of related host species. Here, we test the prevalence of phylosymbiosis and its functional significance under highly controlled conditions by characterizing the microbiota of 24 animal species from four different groups (Peromyscus deer mice, Drosophila flies, mosquitoes, and Nasonia wasps), and we reevaluate the phylosymbiotic relationships of seven species of wild hominids. We demonstrate three key findings. First, intraspecific microbiota variation is consistently less than interspecific microbiota variation, and microbiota-based…

• NS
  National Science Foundation

  Awards: 1400456, 1456778, 1046149
• UO
  University of Virginia
• UO
  University of South Carolina
• DO
  Division of Biological Infrastructure

  Award: 1400456
• DO
  Division of Integrative Organismal Systems

  Award: 1456778
• DO
  Division of Environmental Biology