BASELINE CUTANEOUS BACTERIA OF FREE-LIVING NEW ZEALAND NATIVE FROGS (LEIOPELMA ARCHEYIANDLEIOPELMA HOCHSTETTERI) AND IMPLICATIONS FOR THEIR ROLE IN DEFENSE AGAINST THE AMPHIBIAN CHYTRID (BATRACHOCHYTRIUM DENDROBATIDIS)

Shaw, Stephen B.; Berger, Lee; Bell, Sara C.; Dodd, Sarah Drakopoulou; James, Timothy Y.; Skerratt, Lee F.; Bishop, Phillip J.; Speare, Rick

doi:10.7589/2013-07-186

Cited by 14 publications

(10 citation statements)

References 35 publications

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“…There is a growing body of evidence that host skin microbiome communities affect host health. Several studies have shown that Bd- inhibiting skin bacteria from hosts can inhibit Bd growth and limit the effects of Bd on susceptible amphibians ( 36 , 80 , 86 , 87 ), and Bd inhibiting skin bacteria occur on many amphibian species ( 58 , 88 , 89 ), including terrestrial salamanders that live in California ( 90 , 91 ). In this study we found Bd inhibiting bacteria on both focal salamander species, with a high percentage of culturable species exhibiting Bd inhibition ( B. luciae , 100%; A. lugubris , 81.2%, and A. lugubris eggs, 75%) compared to other studies ( 58 , 89 , 92 , 93 ).…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Social Behavior, Community Composition, Pathogen Strain, and Host Symbionts Influence Fungal Disease Dynamics in Salamanders

et al. 2021

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The emerging fungal pathogen, Batrachochytrium dendrobatidis (Bd), which can cause a fatal disease called chytridiomycosis, is implicated in the collapse of hundreds of host amphibian species. We describe chytridiomycosis dynamics in two co-occurring terrestrial salamander species, the Santa Lucia Mountains slender salamander, Batrachoseps luciae, and the arboreal salamander, Aneides lugubris. We (1) conduct a retrospective Bd-infection survey of specimens collected over the last century, (2) estimate present-day Bd infections in wild populations, (3) use generalized linear models (GLM) to identify biotic and abiotic correlates of infection risk, (4) investigate susceptibility of hosts exposed to Bd in laboratory trials, and (5) examine the ability of host skin bacteria to inhibit Bd in culture. Our historical survey of 2,866 specimens revealed that for most of the early 20th century (~1920–1969), Bd was not detected in either species. By the 1990s the proportion of infected specimens was 29 and 17% (B. luciae and A. lugubris, respectively), and in the 2010s it was 10 and 17%. This was similar to the number of infected samples from contemporary populations (2014–2015) at 10 and 18%. We found that both hosts experience signs of chytridiomycosis and suffered high Bd-caused mortality (88 and 71% for B. luciae and A. lugubris, respectively). Our GLM revealed that Bd-infection probability was positively correlated with intraspecific group size and proximity to heterospecifics but not to abiotic factors such as precipitation, minimum temperature, maximum temperature, mean temperature, and elevation, or to the size of the hosts. Finally, we found that both host species contain symbiotic skin-bacteria that inhibit growth of Bd in laboratory trials. Our results provide new evidence consistent with other studies showing a relatively recent Bd invasion of amphibian host populations in western North America and suggest that the spread of the pathogen may be enabled both through conspecific and heterospecific host interactions. Our results suggest that wildlife disease studies should assess host-pathogen dynamics that consider the interactions and effects of multiple hosts, as well as the historical context of pathogen invasion, establishment, and epizootic to enzootic transitions to better understand and predict disease dynamics.

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Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Social Behavior, Community Composition, Pathogen Strain, and Host Symbionts Influence Fungal Disease Dynamics in Salamanders

et al. 2021

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“…Frogs were swabbed (1 swab/frog) by running the natural fibre cotton tip across each of the following surfaces three times: dorsal (anterior to posterior), ventral (anterior to posterior), lateral (left and right sides), front legs from armpit to wrist (left and right sides) and back legs from groin to ankle (left and right sides) (adapted from Shaw et al [ 24 ] and Antwis et al [ 14 ] (Fig. 1 ).…”

Section: Bacteria Sample Collectionmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…During swab collection, frogs were removed from their individual containers and handled with separate sterile gloves (Skinshield powderfree latex gloves, Livingstone International, Rosebery, NSW, Australia) to prevent cross contamination of cutaneous bacteria [ 14,23 ]. Immediately prior to sampling, frogs were rinsed once with 30mL sterile water to remove transient bacteria [ 6,23,24 ], ensuring minimal handling to prevent loss of cutaneous bacteria.…”

Section: Bacteria Sample Collectionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Dietary Carotenoid Supplementation Enhances the Cutaneous Bacterial Communities of the Critically Endangered Southern Corroboree Frog (Pseudophryne corroboree)

et al. 2016

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. (2017). Dietary carotenoid supplementation enhances the cutaneous bacterial communities of the critically endangered southern corroboree frog (Pseudophryne corroboree). Microbial Ecology: an international journal, 73 (2), 435-444.Dietary carotenoid supplementation enhances the cutaneous bacterial communities of the critically endangered southern corroboree frog (Pseudophryne corroboree) AbstractThe rapid spread of infectious disease has resulted in the decline of animal populations globally. Amphibians support a diversity of microbial symbionts on their skin surface that help to inhibit pathogen colonisation and reduce disease susceptibility and virulence. These cutaneous microbial communities represent an important component of amphibian immune defence, however, very little is known about the environmental factors that influence the cutaneous microbiome. Here, we characterise the cutaneous bacterial communities of a captive colony of the critically endangered Australian southern corroboree frog, Pseudophyrne corroboree, and examine the effect of dietary carotenoid supplementation on bacterial abundance, species richness and community composition. Individuals receiving a carotenoid-supplemented diet exhibited significantly higher bacterial abundance and species richness as well as an altered bacterial community composition compared to individuals that did not receive dietary carotenoids. Our findings suggest that dietary carotenoid supplementation enhances the cutaneous bacteria community of the southern corroboree frog and regulates the presence of bacteria species within the cutaneous microbiome. Our study is the second to demonstrate that carotenoid supplementation can improve amphibian cutaneous bacterial community dynamics, drawing attention to the possibility that dietary manipulation may assist with the ex situ management of endangered species and improve resilience to lethal pathogens such as Batrachochytrium dendrobatidis (Bd).

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“…The present study provides evidence that low nutrient R2A, relative to other common culture media, allows the growth of a higher diversity of bacterial taxa and recovers a higher proportion of the overall diversity occurring on the amphibian skin. These findings are relevant given that R2A has been widely used in the isolation of amphibian skin bacteria (e.g., Harris et al, 2006 ; Flechas et al, 2012 ; Daskin et al, 2014 ; Shaw et al, 2014 ; Antwis et al, 2015 ; Becker et al, 2015 ; Madison et al, 2017 ), despite no evidence of its proficiency. We suggest that an understanding of the ecological interactions influencing the plated communities and the nature of the culture media will likely improve our ability to culture rare or previously uncultured microbes.…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 94%

Culture Media and Individual Hosts Affect the Recovery of Culturable Bacterial Diversity from Amphibian Skin

et al. 2017

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One current challenge in microbial ecology is elucidating the functional roles of the large diversity of free-living and host-associated bacteria identified by culture-independent molecular methods. Importantly, the characterization of this immense bacterial diversity will likely require merging data from culture-independent approaches with work on bacterial isolates in culture. Amphibian skin bacterial communities have become a recent focus of work in host-associated microbial systems due to the potential role of these skin bacteria in host defense against the pathogenic fungus Batrachochytrium dendrobatidis (Bd), which is associated with global amphibian population declines and extinctions. As there is evidence that some skin bacteria may inhibit growth of Bd and prevent infection in some cases, there is interest in using these bacteria as probiotic therapy for conservation of at-risk amphibians. In this study, we used skin swabs from American toads (Anaxyrus americanus) to: (1) assess the diversity and community structure of culturable amphibian skin bacteria grown on high and low nutrient culture media, (2) determine which culture media recover the highest proportion of the total skin bacterial community of individual toads relative to culture-independent data, and (3) assess whether the plated communities from the distinct media types vary in their ability to inhibit Bd growth in in-vitro assays. Overall, we found that culture media with low nutrient concentrations facilitated the growth of more diverse bacterial taxa and grew distinct communities relative to media with higher nutrient concentrations. Use of low nutrient media also resulted in culturing proportionally more of the bacterial diversity on individual toads relative to the overall community defined using culture-independent methods. However, while there were differences in diversity among media types, the variation among individual hosts was greater than variation among media types, suggesting that swabbing more individuals in a population is the best way to maximize culture collections, regardless of media type. Lastly, the function of the plated communities against Bd did not vary across culture media type or between high and low nutrient media. These results inform current efforts for developing a probiotic-based approach for amphibian conservation and help to ensure that culture collections are capturing the majority of the important diversity in these systems.

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BASELINE CUTANEOUS BACTERIA OF FREE-LIVING NEW ZEALAND NATIVE FROGS (LEIOPELMA ARCHEYIANDLEIOPELMA HOCHSTETTERI) AND IMPLICATIONS FOR THEIR ROLE IN DEFENSE AGAINST THE AMPHIBIAN CHYTRID (BATRACHOCHYTRIUM DENDROBATIDIS)

Cited by 14 publications

References 35 publications

Social Behavior, Community Composition, Pathogen Strain, and Host Symbionts Influence Fungal Disease Dynamics in Salamanders

Social Behavior, Community Composition, Pathogen Strain, and Host Symbionts Influence Fungal Disease Dynamics in Salamanders

Dietary Carotenoid Supplementation Enhances the Cutaneous Bacterial Communities of the Critically Endangered Southern Corroboree Frog (Pseudophryne corroboree)

Culture Media and Individual Hosts Affect the Recovery of Culturable Bacterial Diversity from Amphibian Skin

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