Lower methane emissions were associated with higher abundance of ruminal Prevotella in a cohort of Colombian buffalos

BMC Microbiology

article

Aguilar-Marin, Sandra Bibiana¹  Betancur-Murillo, Claudia Lorena²  Isaza, Gustavo A.³  Mesa, Henry¹  Jovel, Juan⁴ 

[1] Universidad de Caldas;Universidad Nacional Abierta y a Distancia;Departamento de Sistemas e Informática - Facultad de Ingenierías, Universidad de Caldas;Office of Research. Faculty of Medicine and Dentistry, University of Alberta

关键词: Methane emissions;    Methanogenesis;    Prevotella abundance;    Propionic acid synthesis;   

DOI  :  10.1186/s12866-020-02037-6

学科分类：放射科、核医学、医学影像

来源: BioMed Central

【 摘 要 】

Ruminants burp massive amounts of methane into the atmosphere and significantly contribute to the deposition of greenhouse gases and the consequent global warming. It is therefore urgent to devise strategies to mitigate ruminant’s methane emissions to alleviate climate change. Ruminal methanogenesis is accomplished by a series of methanogen archaea in the phylum Euryarchaeota, which piggyback into carbohydrate fermentation by utilizing residual hydrogen to produce methane. Abundance of methanogens, therefore, is expected to affect methane production. Furthermore, availability of hydrogen produced by cellulolytic bacteria acting upstream of methanogens is a rate-limiting factor for methane production. The aim of our study was to identify microbes associated with the production of methane which would constitute the basis for the design of mitigation strategies. Moderate differences in the abundance of methanogens were observed between groups. In addition, we present three lines of evidence suggesting an apparent higher abundance of a consortium of Prevotella species in animals with lower methane emissions. First, taxonomic classification revealed increased abundance of at least 29 species of Prevotella. Second, metagenome assembly identified increased abundance of Prevotella ruminicola and another species of Prevotella. Third, metabolic profiling of predicted proteins uncovered 25 enzymes with homology to Prevotella proteins more abundant in the low methane emissions group. We propose that higher abundance of ruminal Prevotella increases the production of propionic acid and, in doing so, reduces the amount of hydrogen available for methanogenesis. However, further experimentation is required to ascertain the role of Prevotella on methane production and its potential to act as a methane production mitigator.

【 授权许可】

CC BY|CC0