title: Animal-microbe interactions and the evolution of nervous systems.
abstract: Animals ubiquitously interact with environmental and symbiotic microbes, and the effects of these interactions on animal physiology are currently the subject of intense interest. Nevertheless, the influence of microbes on nervous system evolution has been largely ignored. We illustrate here how taking microbes into account might enrich our ideas about the evolution of nervous systems. For example, microbes are involved in animals' communicative, defensive, predatory and dispersal behaviours, and have likely influenced the evolution of chemo- and photosensory systems. In addition, we speculate that the need to regulate interactions with microbes at the epithelial surface may have contributed to the evolutionary internalization of the nervous system.
authors.affiliation: Department of Integrative Biology, Michigan State University, 288 Farm Lane Rm 203, East Lansing, MI 48824, USA BEACON Center for the Study of Evolution in Action, 567 Wilson Road Rm 1441, East Lansing, MI 48824, USA eisthen@msu.edu.
authors.forename: Heather L
authors.identifier: http://orcid.org/0000-0002-9049-5750
authors.initials: HL
authors.lastname: Eisthen
authors.affiliation: BEACON Center for the Study of Evolution in Action, 567 Wilson Road Rm 1441, East Lansing, MI 48824, USA Department of Internal Medicine, University of Michigan Medical School, 1150 West Medical Center Drive, MSRB I Rm 1510A, Ann Arbor, MI 48109, USA.
authors.forename: Kevin R
authors.identifier: http://orcid.org/0000-0002-8690-7599
authors.initials: KR
authors.lastname: Theis
mesh_terms: D000818:Animals; D001419:Bacteria; D001522:Behavior, Animal; D005075:Biological Evolution; D002490:Central Nervous System / Q000033:anatomy & histology* / Q000502:physiology*; D007448:Invertebrates / Q000033:anatomy & histology / Q000382:microbiology* / Q000502:physiology; D014714:Vertebrates / Q000033:anatomy & histology / Q000382:microbiology* / Q000502:physiology
keywords: holobiont; microbiome; microbiota; symbiosis