Microbiome of cricket gut and reproductive tract
This project explores the relationship between male sperm viability and male gut and reproductive tract microbiomes in an invertebrate model for male reproduction, the Pacific field cricket, Teleogryllus oceanicus. Fifteen males with the highest and lowest sperm viability were selected, creating two cohorts. For each subset of males, we dissected out the gut and components of the male reproductive tract, including ejaculate, for a total of five compartments, to characterise the bacterial microbiota present in these tissues using 16S ribosomal RNA metabarcoding.