Correlating gut microbial membership to brown bear health metrics.

ABSTRACT: The internal mechanisms responsible for modulating physiological condition, particularly those performed by the gut microbiome (GMB), remain under-explored in wildlife. However, as latitudinal and seasonal shifts in resource availability occur, the myriad micro-ecosystem services facilitated by the GMB may be especially important to wildlife health and resilience. Here, we use brown bears (Ursus arctos) as an ecological model to quantify the relationship between wildlife body condition metrics that are commonly used to assess individual and population-level health and GMB community composition and structure. To achieve these aims, we subsampled brown bear fecal samples collected during United States National Park Service research activities at three National Parks and Preserves (Katmai, La

SUBMITTER: Trujillo SM 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC9499961 | biostudies-literature | 2022 Sep

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature