First look at microbiome composition among the Jaera albifrons species complex, an emerging model system for sympatric speciation.
A microbiome study from Marius Wenzel's post-doctoral research prior to joining the CGEBM has now been published in PLoS ONE. This study characterised the microbiomes of a set of closely related marine isopod species with the aim of identifying the presence of sex-ratio distorting reproductive parasites (such as Wolbachia) and explore whether microbiome structure may be linked to eco-evolutionary processes in this species complex.
There was very little evidence of reproductive parasites, but overall microbiome structure was associated with sex and to a much greater extent by geography and time of year. The results highlight how microbiome composition may strongly be affected by environmental factors, but also provide a first look at how Jaera reproductive biology may be associated with microbe assemblages.
The full publication is .
More information of Marius's research activities can be found on his and University staff pages.
Marius joined the CGEBM as a bioinformatician in June 2018 and provides expertise in genomics and transcriptomics in non-model systems.