Geographical resistome profiling in the honeybee microbiome reveals resistance gene transfer conferred by mobilizable plasmids.

ABSTRACT:

Background

The spread of antibiotic resistance genes (ARGs) has been of global concern as one of the greatest environmental threats. The gut microbiome of animals has been found to be a large reservoir of ARGs, which is also an indicator of the environmental antibiotic spectrum. The conserved microbiota makes the honeybee a tractable and confined ecosystem for studying the maintenance and transfer of ARGs across gut bacteria. Although it has been found that honeybee gut bacteria harbor diverse sets of ARGs, the influences of environmental variables and the mechanism driving their distribution remain unclear.

Results

We characterized the gut resistome of two closely related honeybee species, Apis cerana and Apis mellifera, domesticated in 14 geographic locations across China.

SUBMITTER: Sun H 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC9063374 | biostudies-literature | 2022 May

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature