Context and challenges

In animals, and particularly mammals, studying the influence of host genetics on composition of the gut microbiota is hampered by the problem of clearly dissociating microbiota variability due to genetic effects from that due to environmental effects, linked notably to transmission of the maternal microbiota at birth. A formal demonstration of the possibilities of host-microbiota evolution (holobiont) by directional selection over several generations would enable progress in answering this question.

Goals

Our goal is to use pigs to study the effects of host genetics on the gut microbiota, considered not just as a simple phenotype but as a dynamic ecosystem that co-evolves with its host within the framework of the holobiont concept.  

We propose to develop and use a study model based on the constitution of pig lines that contrast in terms of two enterotypes, in order to:

1. Study the intergenerational transmission of enterotypes and their association with breeding traits;
2. Study the influence of the peri-postnatal maternal environment through crossed adoptions;
3. Characterise the detailed taxonomic composition of the two enterotypes through quantitative metagenomic analyses, exploiting the catalogue of genes present in the gut microbiota of pigs;
4. Assess the feasibility and usefulness of a rapid and reliable test to classify animals by enterotype;
5. Determine the evolutionary dynamics of enterotypes.

INRAE partners