RT Journal Article SR Electronic T1 Stable association of a Drosophila-derived microbiota with its animal partner and the nutritional environment upon transfer between populations and generations JF bioRxiv FD Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory SP 111492 DO 10.1101/111492 A1 Mélisandre A. Téfit A1 Benjamin Gillet A1 Pauline Joncour A1 Sandrine Hughes A1 François Leulier YR 2017 UL http://biorxiv.org/content/early/2017/02/24/111492.abstract AB In the past years, the fruit fly Drosophila melanogaster has been extensively used to study the relationship between animals and their associated microbes. Compared to the one of wild populations, the microbiota of laboratory-reared flies is less diverse, and comprises fewer bacterial taxa; nevertheless, the main commensal bacteria found in fly microbiota always belong to the Acetobacteraceae and Lactobacillaceae families. The bacterial communities associated with the fly are environmentally acquired, and the partners engage in a perpetual re-association process. Adult flies constantly ingest and excrete microbes from and onto their feeding substrate, which are then transmitted to the next generation developing within this shared habitat. We wanted to analyze the potential changes in the bacterial community during its reciprocal transfer between the two compartments of the niche (i.e. the fly and the diet). To address this question, we used a diverse, wild-derived microbial community and analyzed its relationship with the fly population and the nutritive substrate in a given habitat. Here we show that the community was overall well maintained upon transmission to a new niche, to a new fly population and to their progeny, illustrating the stable association of a Drosophila-derived microbiota with its fly partner and the nutritional environment. These results highlight the preponderant role of the nutritional substrate in the dynamics of Drosophila/microbiota interactions, and the need to fully integrate this variable when performing such studies.