High Throughput Sequencing and Network Analysis Disentangle the Microbial Communities of Ticks and Hosts Within and Between Ecosystems.

ABSTRACT: We aimed to develop a framework, based on graph theory, to capture the ecological meaning behind pure pair comparisons of microbiome-derived data. As a proof of concept, we applied the framework to analyze the co-occurrence of bacteria in either Ixodes ricinus ticks or the spleen of one of their main hosts, the vole Myodes glareolus. As a secondary lymphoid organ, the spleen acts as a filter of blood and represents well the exposure to microorganisms circulating in the blood; including those acquired and transmitted by ticks during feeding. The microbiome of 301 and 269 individual tick and vole samples, respectively, were analyzed using next generation sequencing (NGS) of 16S rRNA. To assess the effect of habitat on ecological communities of bacteria associated to ticks and v

SUBMITTER: Estrada-Pena A 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC6046413 | biostudies-literature | 2018

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature