Unravelling the metagenomic landscape of gut microbiota in endangered proboscis monkey across Malaysian Borneo: Conservation and ecological insight

Abstract

Numerous research on the gut microbial diversity of non-human primates (NHP) has been done to evaluate the impact of environmental changes on the diversity of gut microbiota and to determine the mutualistic relationship between the animals and gut microbes that aid in their adaptation to living in an altered environment. The metagenomics approach was employed to explore gut microbial diversity and abundance in the endangered and endemic proboscis monkeys of Borneo. The amplicon sequencing of the 16S ribosomal RNA (rRNA) gene from 24 faecal samples successfully generated over two million raw reads of bacteria (98%) and archaea (2%) representing 4030 OTUs. Gut microbial diversity and abundance vary across different populations, i.e.: wild, semi-wild and captivity, suggesting that higher diversity was discovered in individuals inhabiting areas with higher food resource availability in natural habitats. The observed alterations in gut microbial diversity and abundance among proboscis monkey populations inhabiting distinct environmental conditions in this study provide empirical evidence for the impact of environmental changes on the proboscis monkey’s gut microbiota. Besides, the prevalence of pathogenic bacteria identified in the proboscis monkey’s gut highlights the potential hazards associated with human-primate interactions and raises the urgent need for public health management. [197 words]