title: The effect of helminth infection on the microbial composition and structure of the caprine abomasal microbiome.
abstract: Haemonchus contortus is arguably the most injurious helminth parasite for small ruminants. We characterized the impact of H. contortus infection on the caprine abomasal microbiome. Fourteen parasite naive goats were inoculated with 5,000 H. contortus infective larvae and followed for 50 days. Six age-matched naïve goats served as uninfected controls. Reduced bodyweight gain and a significant increase in the abosamal pH was observed in infected goats compared to uninfected controls. Infection also increased the bacterial load while reducing the abundance of the Archaea in the abomasum but did not appear to affect microbial diversity. Nevertheless, the infection altered the abundance of approximately 19% of the 432 species-level operational taxonomic units (OTU) detected per sample. A total of 30 taxa displayed a significantly different abundance between control and infected goats. Furthermore, the infection resulted in a distinct difference in the microbiome structure. As many as 8 KEGG pathways were predicted to be significantly affected by infection. In addition, H. contortus-induced changes in butyrate producing bacteria could regulate mucosal inflammation and tissue repair. Our results provided insight into physiological consequences of helminth infection in small ruminants and could facilitate the development of novel control strategies to improve animal and human health.
authors: United States Department of Agriculture, Agriculture Research Service (USDA-ARS), Animal Genomics and Improvement Laboratory, Beltsville, MD 20705, USA.
authors: Robert W
authors: RW
authors: Li
authors: J. Craig Venter Institute, La Jolla, CA, 92037, USA.
authors: Weizhong
authors: W
authors: Li
authors: United States Department of Agriculture, Agriculture Research Service (USDA-ARS), Animal Genomics and Improvement Laboratory, Beltsville, MD 20705, USA.
authors: Jiajie
authors: J
authors: Sun
authors: Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering &TEES-AgriLife Center for Bioinformatics and Genomic Systems Engineering (CBGSE) Texas A&M University, College Station, TX 77843, USA.
authors: Peng
authors: P
authors: Yu
authors: United States Department of Agriculture, Agriculture Research Service (USDA-ARS), Animal Genomics and Improvement Laboratory, Beltsville, MD 20705, USA.
authors: Ransom L
authors: RL
authors: Baldwin
authors: USDA-ARS, Beltsville Human Nutrition Research Center, Diet, Genomics, and Immunology Laboratory, Beltsville, MD, USA.
authors: Joseph F
authors: JF
authors: Urban
mesh_terms: D000018:Abomasum / Q000737:chemistry / Q000382:microbiology*; D000818:Animals; D001419:Bacteria / Q000235:genetics / Q000302:isolation & purification; D001835:Body Weight; D016022:Case-Control Studies; D006041:Goats; D006188:Haemonchiasis / Q000469:parasitology / Q000473:pathology* / Q000662:veterinary; D006189:Haemonchus / Q000472:pathogenicity*; D006863:Hydrogen-Ion Concentration; D008297:Male; D064307:Microbiota; D016133:Polymerase Chain Reaction; D025341:Principal Component Analysis; D012336:RNA, Ribosomal, 16S / Q000235:genetics / Q000378:metabolism; D017422:Sequence Analysis, DNA
chemical_list: D012336:RNA, Ribosomal, 16S