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ORIGINAL RESEARCH article
Front. Microbiol.
Sec. Microbial Symbioses
Volume 16 - 2025 | doi: 10.3389/fmicb.2025.1575405
This article is part of the Research Topic Microbial Symbiosis and Infectious Disease Dynamics in Reptiles and Wildfowl View all 5 articles
Characterization and comparison of the fecal bacterial microbiota in Red back pine root snake (Oligodon formosanus) and Chinese slug-eating snake (Pareas chinensis)
Provisionally accepted- 1 Guangdong Provincial Key Laboratory of Organ Donation and Transplant Immunology, The First Affiliated Hospital, Sun Yat-sen University, Guangzhou, China
- 2 Department of Infectious Diseases and Public Health, College of Veterinary Medicine and Life Sciences, City University of Hong Kong, Kowloon, Hong Kong, SAR China
- 3 Fu Shun Vocational Technology Institute, Fu Shun, China
The gastrointestinal tracts and oral cavities of animals harbor complex microbial communities that assist hosts in nutrient absorption and immune responses, thereby influencing behavior, development, reproduction, and overall health. In this study, we utilized metagenomic sequencing technology to conduct a detailed analysis of the fecal bacterial communities of six Red Back Pine Root Snakes (Oligodon formosanus, XT) and three Chinese Slug-Eating Snakes (Pareas chinensis, Z) to examine the differences in microbial community composition in different environments. The results indicated that Proteobacteria, Bacteroidetes, Firmicutes, Verrucomicrobia, Actinobacteria, and Fusobacteria are the dominant phyla in the Red Back Pine Root Snakes (XT species), while the Chinese Slug-Eating Snakes (Z species) includes Patescibacteria in addition to these six. Additionally, alpha diversity analysis revealed significant differences in species abundance at the family level between the two snake species, with the species abundance in Z samples being significantly higher than that in XT. Finally, Kyoto Encyclopedia of Genes and Genomes (KEGG) analysis of the functional genes in the microbial communities revealed that compared to Z, XT showed higher abundance in pathways related to transcription, translation, environmental adaptation, membrane transport, cellular communities - prokaryotes, cellular motility, and replication and repair. This is likely due to the different living environments and dietary habits of the two snake species. Overall, this study provided a comparative analysis of the gut microbiota of the two snake species, offering valuable insights for future research on zoonotic diseases, as well as on the environment, ecology, evolution, behavior, and seasonality in relation to humans and snakes.
Keywords: Red back pine root snake (Oligodon formosanus), Chinese slug-eating snake (Pareas chinensis), Gut Microbiota, Microbial function, bacterial pathogens
Received: 12 Feb 2025; Accepted: 25 Mar 2025.
Copyright: © 2025 Xiao, Xiangnan and Fei. This is an open-access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (CC BY). The use, distribution or reproduction in other forums is permitted, provided the original author(s) or licensor are credited and that the original publication in this journal is cited, in accordance with accepted academic practice. No use, distribution or reproduction is permitted which does not comply with these terms.
* Correspondence:
Tong Fei, Fu Shun Vocational Technology Institute, Fu Shun, China
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