ArticleThe ISME journal2012
Metagenomic and metaproteomic insights into bacterial communities in leaf-cutter ant fungus gardens.
Article in The ISME journal, 2012. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Cited by 70 papers, 1 of them a synthesis that pooled it.
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Who cites it
70 citing papers in PubMed, 1 synthesis or guideline pooled it, 134 citations in OpenAlex.
- Soil and leaf litter metaproteomics-a brief guideline from sampling to understanding.FEMS microbiology ecology · 2016Guideline
- Ant abaecin-2 is a context-dependent copper-binding effector that can be either inhibitory or protective.bioRxiv : the preprint server for biology · 2026Article
- Bacterial Diversity in Leaf-Cutter Ant Species: Host-Microbe Interactions and Environmental Effects.Neotropical entomology · 2026Article
- Cross-domain cooperation drives nutrient acquisition and metabolism in the bark beetle holobiont.The ISME journal · 2026Article
- Deciphering taxon-specific metabolic shifts during pathogenic fungal infection in leaf-cutter ant fungal gardens.ISME communications · 2026Article
- You are what your fungus eats: diet shapes the microbial garden of a fungus-growing ant.NPJ biofilms and microbiomes · 2025Article
- The microbiologist's guide to metaproteomics.iMeta · 2025Review
- Bacterial communities of fungus-growing ant queens are species-specific and suggest vertical transmission.PloS one · 2025Article
- The mobilome landscape of biocide-resistance in Brazilian ESKAPE isolates.Brazilian journal of microbiology : [publication of the Brazilian Society for Microbiology] · 2024Article
- Mapping microhabitats of lignocellulose decomposition by a microbial consortium.Nature chemical biology · 2024Article
- The Hyphosphere of Leaf-Cutting Ant Cultivars Is Enriched with Helper Bacteria.Microbial ecology · 2023Article
- Environments and Hosts Structure the Bacterial Microbiomes of Fungus-Gardening Ants and their Symbiotic Fungus Gardens.Microbial ecology · 2023Article
- Symbiotic Bacteria ModulateInternational journal of molecular sciences · 2023Article
- Review
- Gut symbiotic bacteria are involved in nitrogen recycling in the tephritid fruit fly Bactrocera dorsalis.BMC biology · 2022Article
- The Symbiotic FungusInsects · 2022Review
- A fungal symbiont converts provisioned cellulose into edible yield for its leafcutter ant farmers.Biology letters · 2022Article
- Nitrogen Acquisition Strategies Mediated by Insect Symbionts: A Review of Their Mechanisms, Methodologies, and Case Studies.Insects · 2022Review
- Lessons From Insect Fungiculture: From Microbial Ecology to Plastics Degradation.Frontiers in microbiology · 2022Article
- Chemical Gradients of Plant Substrates in anmSystems · 2021Article
10 more citing papers are in PubMed but not listed here.
Corrections and comments
PubMed lists nothing against this paper. Absence here is not a guarantee, only a check that was made.
Authors and funding
15 authors at 4 institutions in 2 countries.
Funding
No grant is acknowledged in the PubMed record.
Abstract
Herbivores gain access to nutrients stored in plant biomass largely by harnessing the metabolic activities of microbes. Leaf-cutter ants of the genus Atta are a hallmark example; these dominant neotropical herbivores cultivate symbiotic fungus gardens on large quantities of fresh plant forage. As the external digestive system of the ants, fungus gardens facilitate the production and sustenance of millions of workers. Using metagenomic and metaproteomic techniques, we characterize the bacterial diversity and physiological potential of fungus gardens from two species of Atta. Our analysis of over 1.2 Gbp of community metagenomic sequence and three 16S pyrotag libraries reveals that in addition to harboring the dominant fungal crop, these ecosystems contain abundant populations of Enterobacteriaceae, including the genera Enterobacter, Pantoea, Klebsiella, Citrobacter and Escherichia. We show that these bacterial communities possess genes associated with lignocellulose degradation and diverse biosynthetic pathways, suggesting that they play a role in nutrient cycling by converting the nitrogen-poor forage of the ants into B-vitamins, amino acids and other cellular components. Our metaproteomic analysis confirms that bacterial glycosyl hydrolases and proteins with putative biosynthetic functions are produced in both field-collected and laboratory-reared colonies. These results are consistent with the hypothesis that fungus gardens are specialized fungus-bacteria communities that convert plant material into energy for their ant hosts. Together with recent investigations into the microbial symbionts of vertebrates, our work underscores the importance of microbial communities in the ecology and evolution of herbivorous metazoans.
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Registered trials
Read under generation 80e0d062 · epoch 390. Bibliography from PubMed, PubMed Central and OpenAlex; grants from NIH RePORTER; trial links from ClinicalTrials.gov; estimates, votes and beliefs from the OpenQuestion graph.