Continent-wide structure of bacterial microbiomes of European Drosophila melanogaster suggests host-control

Abstract

The relative importance of host-control, environmental effects, and stochasticity in the assemblage of host-associated microbiomes has been much debated. With recent sampling efforts, the underpinnings of D. melanogasters microbiome structure have become tractable on larger spatial scales. We analyzed the microbiome among fly populations that were sampled across Europe by the European Drosophila Population Genomics Consortium (DrosEU). We combined environmental data on climate and food-substrate, dense genomic data on host population structure, and microbiome profiling. Food-substrate, temperature, and host population-structure correlated with microbiome-structure. The microbes, whose abundance was co-structured with host populations, also differed in abundance between flies and their substrate in an independent survey, suggesting host-control. Patterns of enrichment and depletion of microbes between host and substrate were consistent with a model of host-control, where the host manipulates its microbiome for its benefit. Putative host-control was bacterial strain specific, supporting recent evidence for high specificity of D. melanogaster-microbe interaction.