PRJNA385010
Bacterial and archaeal diversity on mammalian skin
Characterization of the microorganisms on skin is essential for understanding how a host evolves in association with its microbial symbionts, modeling immune system development, diagnosing illnesses, and exploring the origins and etiology of disease. Although many studies have characterized the human microbiome, far less is known about the skin microbiome of non-human mammals. The objective of this research was to create a baseline skin microbiome dataset for the Mammalia class, testing the effects of species, location, hygiene, body region, and biological sex. The back, torso, and inner thigh regions of 187 non-human mammals and 20 human participants were collected to include representatives from 38 species and 10 mammalian orders. Animals were collected from local farms, zoos, households, and the wild. All samples were amplified using the V3-V4 16S rRNA gene region and sequenced using a MiSeq (Illumina). Human skin was significantly less diverse than all other mammalian orders according to Shannon indices (6.54 versus 3.96, p < 0.001). The factor most strongly associated with community variation for all samples was whether the host was a human (PERMANOVA, F = 37.8, p < 0.001; Figure 2). By analyzing all samples together, random forest modelling identified that human and animal samples could be distinguished correctly 98.51.2% of the time. This study represents the largest mammalian skin microbiome project to date and is the first study to elucidate the skin microbiota for 32 distinct species. Additionally, these findings are the first to demonstrate that human skin is distinct, not only distinct from other Primates, but from all 10 mammalian orders sampled. Baseline data on the mammalian skin microbiome is crucial to make informed decisions for veterinarian research and conservation strategies, as well as providing implications for mammalian evolutionary history.