Exploring the effect of plant substrates on bacterial community structure in termite fungus-combs.

ABSTRACT: Fungus-cultivating termites are successful herbivores largely rely on the external symbiotic fungus-combs to decompose plant polysaccharides. The comb harbors both fungi and bacteria. However, the complementary roles and functions of the bacteria are out of the box. To this purpose, we look into different decomposition stages of fungus-combs using high-throughput sequencing of the 16S rRNA gene to examine bacterial community structure. We also explored the bacterial response to physicochemical indexes (such as moisture, ash content and organic matter) and plant substrates (leaves or branches or mix food). Some specific families such as Lachnospiraceae, Ruminococcaceae, and Peptostreptococcaceae may be involved in lignocellulose degradation, whereas Burkholderiaceae may be associated with a

SUBMITTER: Liang S 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC7194444 | biostudies-literature | 2020

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature