Gut Bacteria Mediate Nutrient Availability in Drosophila Diets.

ABSTRACT: Drosophila melanogaster gut microbes play important roles in host nutritional physiology. However, these associations are often indirect, and studies typically are in the context of specialized nutritional conditions, making it difficult to discern how microbiome-mediated impacts translate to physiologically relevant conditions, in the laboratory or nature. In this study, we quantified changes in dietary nutrients due to D. melanogaster gut bacteria on three artificial diets and a natural diet of grapes. We show that under all four diet conditions, bacteria altered the protein, carbohydrates, and moisture of the food substrate. An in-depth analysis of one diet revealed that bacteria also increased the levels of tryptophan, an essential amino acid encountered scarcely in nature. These nutri

SUBMITTER: Lesperance DNA 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC7755257 | biostudies-literature | 2020 Dec

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature