Abstract

The naked mole-rat (Heterocephalus glaber) is a subterranean mouse-sized African mammal that shows astonishingly few age-related degenerative changes and seems to not be affected by cancer. These features make this wild rodent an excellent model to study the biology of healthy aging and longevity. Here we characterize for the first time the intestinal microbial ecosystem of the naked mole-rat in comparison to humans and other mammals, highlighting peculiarities related to the specific living environment, such as the enrichment in bacteria able to utilize soil sulfate as a terminal electron acceptor to sustain an anaerobic oxidative metabolism. Interestingly, some compositional gut microbiota peculiarities were also shared with human gut microbial ecosystems of centenarians and Hadza hunter-gatherers, considered as models of a healthy gut microbiome and of a homeostatic and highly adaptive gut microbiota-host relationship, respectively. In addition, we found an enrichment of short-chain fatty acids and carbohydrate degradation products in naked mole-rat compared to human samples. These data confirm the importance of the gut microbial ecosystem as an adaptive partner for the mammalian biology and health, independently of the host phylogeny.

Details

Title
Unraveling the gut microbiome of the long-lived naked mole-rat
Author
Debebe, Tewodros 1 ; Biagi, Elena 2 ; Soverini, Matteo 2 ; Holtze, Susanne 3 ; Hildebrandt, Thomas Bernd 3 ; Birkemeyer, Claudia 4 ; Wyohannis, Dereje 5 ; Lemma, Alemayehu 6 ; Brigidi, Patrizia 2 ; Savkovic, Vulk 7 ; König, Brigitte 8 ; Candela, Marco 2 ; Birkenmeier, Gerd 9 

 Institute of Medical Microbiology, Faculty of Medicine, University of Leipzig, Liebigstrasse 21, Leipzig, Germany; College of Medicine and Health Sciences, Bahir Dar University, Bahir Dar, Ethiopia 
 Department of Pharmacy and Biotechnology, Alma Mater Studiorum, University of Bologna, Bologna, Italy 
 Department of Reproduction Management, Leibniz-Institute for Zoo and Wildlife Research, Alfred-Kowalke-Strasse 17, Berlin, Germany 
 Institute of Analytical Chemistry, University of Leipzig, Linnestrasse 3, Leipzig, Germany 
 College of Natural Sciences, Addis Ababa University, Addis Ababa, Ethiopia 
 College of Veterinary Medicine and Agriculture, Addis Ababa University, Addis Ababa, Ethiopia 
 Saxon Incubator for Clinical Translation, University of Leipzig, Phillip-Rosenthal-Str. 55, Leipzig, Germany 
 Institute of Medical Microbiology, Faculty of Medicine, University of Leipzig, Liebigstrasse 21, Leipzig, Germany 
 Institute of Biochemistry, Faculty of Medicine, University of Leipzig, Johannisallee 30, Leipzig, Germany 
Pages
1-9
Publication year
2017
Publication date
Aug 2017
Publisher
Nature Publishing Group
e-ISSN
20452322
Source type
Scholarly Journal
Language of publication
English
ProQuest document ID
1957864288
Copyright
© 2017. This work is published under http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/ (the “License”). Notwithstanding the ProQuest Terms and Conditions, you may use this content in accordance with the terms of the License.