ArticleScientific reports2017
Social odours covary with bacterial community in the anal secretions of wild meerkats.
Article in Scientific reports, 2017. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Cited by 43 papers.
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Who cites it
43 citing papers in PubMed, 74 citations in OpenAlex.
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- The gut microbiome shapes social behaviour across animal species.Nature reviews. Microbiology · 2026Review
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- Geographical variation of chemical signals and odor discrimination in the great Himalayan leaf-nosed bat (Hipposideros armiger).BMC biology · 2026Article
- Microbial Contributions to Primate Reproduction.Evolutionary anthropology · 2026Review
- The Complexity of Communication in Mammals: From Social and Emotional Mechanisms to Human Influence and Multimodal Applications.Animals : an open access journal from MDPI · 2026Review
- The Acari Hypothesis, VIII: the human apocrine-mammary-microbiota axis andFrontiers in microbiology · 2026Article
- Universes within universes: microbiome diversity associated with different body parts of the sand lizard (PeerJ · 2026Article
- Natural variability of trace-amine associated receptors in wild meerkats.Frontiers in zoology · 2025Article
- The Scent Gland Microbiomes of Wild Tamarins Provide New Insight Into Microbial Contributions to Olfactory Communication.Ecology and evolution · 2025Article
- Common scents? A review of potentially shared chemical signals in the order Carnivora.Chemical senses · 2025Review
- Microbial Gatekeepers of Fertility in the Female Reproductive Microbiome of Cattle.International journal of molecular sciences · 2024Review
- Microbiota and the volatile profile of avian nests are associated with each other and with the intensity of parasitism.FEMS microbiology ecology · 2024Article
- Characterizing the metabolome and microbiome at giant panda scent marking sites during the mating season.iScience · 2024Article
- Volatiles of symbiotic bacterial origin explain ectoparasitism and fledging success of hoopoes.Animal microbiome · 2024Article
- Bats, Bacteria, and Bat Smell V.2.0: Repeatable Sex-Specific Differences in Scent Organ Microbiota.Microbial ecology · 2024Article
- Characterization of the microbiome and volatile compounds in anal gland secretions from domestic cats (Felis catus) using metagenomics and metabolomics.Scientific reports · 2023Article
- Characterization of the microbiome and volatile compounds in anal gland secretions from domestic cats (Felis catus) using metagenomics and metabolomics.Research square · 2023Article
- Role of Genital Tract Bacteria in Promoting Endometrial Health in Cattle.Microorganisms · 2022Article
- Uropygial gland microbiota differ between free-living and captive songbirds.Scientific reports · 2022Article
Corrections and comments
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Authors and funding
5 authors at 3 institutions in 3 countries.
Funding
Abstract
The fermentation hypothesis for animal signalling posits that bacteria dwelling in an animal's scent glands metabolize the glands' primary products into odorous compounds used by the host to communicate with conspecifics. There is, however, little evidence of the predicted covariation between an animal's olfactory cues and its glandular bacterial communities. Using gas chromatography-mass spectrometry, we first identified the volatile compounds present in 'pure' versus 'mixed' anal-gland secretions ('paste') of adult meerkats (Suricata suricatta) living in the wild. Low-molecular-weight chemicals that likely derive from bacterial metabolism were more prominent in mixed than pure secretions. Focusing thereafter on mixed secretions, we showed that chemical composition varied by sex and was more similar between members of the same group than between members of different groups. Subsequently, using next-generation sequencing, we identified the bacterial assemblages present in meerkat paste and documented relationships between these assemblages and the host's sex, social status and group membership. Lastly, we found significant covariation between the volatile compounds and bacterial assemblages in meerkat paste, particularly in males. Together, these results are consistent with a role for bacteria in the production of sex- and group-specific scents, and with the evolution of mutualism between meerkats and their glandular microbiota.
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