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Applied and Environmental Microbiology, August 2007, p. 5199-5208, Vol. 73, No. 16
0099-2240/07/$08.00+0     doi:10.1128/AEM.02616-06
Copyright © 2007, American Society for Microbiology. All Rights Reserved.

Differences between Bacterial Communities in the Gut of a Soil-Feeding Termite (Cubitermes niokoloensis) and Its Mounds ^,

Saliou Fall,^1, Jérôme Hamelin,^2, Farma Ndiaye,¹ Komi Assigbetse,¹ Michel Aragno,² Jean Luc Chotte,³ and Alain Brauman^3*

Laboratoire d'Ecologie Microbienne des Sols Tropicaux, IRD-ISRA, BP 1386, Dakar, Sénégal,¹ Laboratoire de Microbiologie, Université de Neuchâtel, Case Postale 2, CH-2007 Neuchâtel, Switzerland,² Unité de Recherche SeqBio, IRD, SupAgro, 2 Place Pierre Viala, 34060 Montpellier Cedex 1, France³

Received 9 November 2006/ Accepted 8 June 2007

In tropical ecosystems, termite mound soils constitute an important soil compartment covering around 10% of African soils. Previous studies have shown (S. Fall, S. Nazaret, J. L. Chotte, and A. Brauman, Microb. Ecol. 28:191-199, 2004) that the bacterial genetic structure of the mounds of soil-feeding termites (Cubitermes niokoloensis) is different from that of their surrounding soil. The aim of this study was to characterize the specificity of bacterial communities within mounds with respect to the digestive and soil origins of the mound. We have compared the bacterial community structures of a termite mound, termite gut sections, and surrounding soil using PCR-denaturing gradient gel electrophoresis (DGGE) analysis and cloning and sequencing of PCR-amplified 16S rRNA gene fragments. DGGE analysis revealed a drastic difference between the genetic structures of the bacterial communities of the termite gut and the mound. Analysis of 266 clones, including 54 from excised bands, revealed a high level of diversity in each biota investigated. The soil-feeding termite mound was dominated by the Actinobacteria phylum, whereas the Firmicutes and Proteobacteria phyla dominate the gut sections of termites and the surrounding soil, respectively. Phylogenetic analyses revealed a distinct clustering of Actinobacteria phylotypes between the mound and the surrounding soil. The Actinobacteria clones of the termite mound were diverse, distributed among 10 distinct families, and like those in the termite gut environment lightly dominated by the Nocardioidaceae family. Our findings confirmed that the soil-feeding termite mound (C. niokoloensis) represents a specific bacterial habitat in the tropics.

Published ahead of print on 15 June 2007.

Supplemental material for this article may be found at http://aem.asm.org/.

Present address: Environmental Microbial Genomics Group, Laboratoire AMPERE UMRCNRS 5005, Ecole Centrale de Lyon, 36 avenue Guy de Collongue, 69134 Ecully Cedex, France.

Present address: INRA, UR 050, Laboratoire de biotechnologie de l'environnement, Avenue des étangs, Narbonne F-11100, France.