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キーワード:
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要旨:
The mammalian gut is a great place for microbes: a constant warm temperature, predictable moisture and pH, and—if life is good for the host—a steady supply of food. In return for such a rich habitat, microbes perform key services such as fiber digestion. This is critical for the vast majority of mammals, whose genomes do not encode the enzymes required to degrade the plant polysaccharides. Indeed, the evolution of mammals is deeply entwined with the history of the gut symbionts that enable the consumption of all types of plants. One intriguing aspect of microbial diversity across mammals is that related species often harbor similar gut microbial communities, a pattern termed phylosymbiosis (1). The root causes of phylosymbiosis, and the implications of this process for host–microbial interactions and coevolution, are largely unexplored.
