Data for: Environments and hosts structure the bacterial microbiomes of fungus-gardening ants and their symbiotic fungus gardens
- 1. The University of Texas at Tyler
- 2. University of Minnesota
Description
The fungus gardening-ant system is considered a complex, multi-tiered symbiosis between the ants, their fungus, and microorganisms associated with either ants or fungus. We examine the bacterial microbiome of Trachymyrmex septentrionalis and Mycetomoellerius turrifex ants and their symbiotic fungus garden, using 16S rRNA Illumina sequencing, over a large geographical region. Typically microorganisms can be acquired from a parent colony (vertical transmission) or from the environment (horizontal transmission). Because the symbiosis is characterized by co-dispersal of the ants and fungus, elements of both ant and fungus garden microbiome could be characterized by vertical transmission, for example. The goals of this study were to explore how both the ant and fungus garden bacterial microbiome were acquired. The main findings were that different mechanisms appear to explain the structure the microbiomes of ants and their symbiotic fungus gardens. Ant associated microbiomes had a strong host ant signature, which suggests vertical inheritance of the ant associated bacterial microbiome. On the other hand, the bacterial microbiome of the fungus garden was more complex in that some components appear to be structured by the ant host species whereas other by fungal lineage or region. Thus bacteria in fungus gardens appear to be acquired both horizontally and vertically.
Notes
"OTU_Table_Metadata.csv" contains both the metadata for each sample (row) and the OTUs present in each sample. The below information can also be found in the "ReadMe.txt" file.
Columns 1-6 contain the metadata for each sample. "Index" contains the unique identifier given to each sample. "Type" determines whether the sample is from an ant, fungal garden material (Fungus), or soil sample. "Species" describes whether the sample is associated with T. septentrionalis and M. turrifex. "Location" describes the exact site the sample was taken. "Region" describes whether the sample was collected in East Texas (East) or Central Texas (Central). "Clade" describes the fungal clade (B3, B4, or B5) associated with the fungal garden of each sample's colony. For the samples associated with the one colony that whose fungal garden was not genotyped, the fungal clade is denoted with "*".
The remaining columns contain the number of sequences for the OTU, denoted in the top row, for each sample. The OTU label denoted in the top row contains the full taxonomic information availabe for that OTU. D_0__ denotes the OTU's kingdom, D_1__ denotes the OTU's phylum, D_2__ denotes the OTU's class, etc.
Funding provided by: National Science Foundation
Crossref Funder Registry ID: http://dx.doi.org/10.13039/100000001
Award Number: IOS-1552822
Funding provided by: National Science Foundation
Crossref Funder Registry ID: http://dx.doi.org/10.13039/100000001
Award Number: DEB-1354629
Funding provided by: Texas Ecolab*
Crossref Funder Registry ID:
Award Number:
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OTU_Table_Metadata.csv
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Additional details
Related works
- Is cited by
- 10.1007/s00248-022-02138-x (DOI)