Publikationsdatenbank

Investigating the microbiome of the helminth parasite Ascaris suum by fluorescence in situ hybridization (2022)

Art

Poster

Autor

Hayani, Rima (WE 6)

Kongress

Microbiome Network Meeting + BBQ

Berlin, 20.07.2022

Quelle

Microbiome Network Meeting + BBQ : July 20, 2022 — FoodBerlin research network (Hrsg.)

Berlin, 2022 — S. 32

Sprache

Englisch

Verweise

URL (Volltext): https://www.vetmed.fu-berlin.de/news/_ressourcen/Proceedings-Microbiome-Network-Meeting-2022.pdf

Kontakt

Institut für Immunologie

Robert-von-Ostertag-Str. 7-13
14163 Berlin
+49 30 838 51834
immunologie@vetmed.fu-berlin.de

Abstract / Zusammenfassung

Parasitic nematodes infect over a billion people and are highly prevalent in wild, livestock, and companion animals. Ascariasis is the most prevalent helminth infection of humans and a major economic burden in conventional pig farming. Ascaris suum lives the majority of its life in the intestine
of its host, surrounded by microbes. Furthermore, Ascaris itself has an intestine which is colonized by bacteria. However, interactions between Ascaris and the microbes in and around the worm are still poorly understood. The purpose of the current study was to study the microbiome of A. suum with a
particular emphasis on the basic composition of the parasite microbiome and its location within the nematode intestine. We used Fluorescence in situ hybridization (FISH) to visualize bacteria along the intestines of adult A. suum worms obtained from a local slaughterhouse. The worms were cut in cross
sections, fixed, embedded, and then a fluorescent probe for the 16S rRNA gene was applied. The sections were scanned using fluorescence microscopy and bacterial cells were counted. Preliminary findings indicate that live bacteria can indeed be visualized inside the intestines of adult Ascaris worms. We were only able to detect live bacteria within the intestine while all other tissues appeared to be free of bacteria. Furthermore, female worms appear to harbor more bacteria than male worms.
Ongoing work is underway to identify the visualized bacteria by sequencing of the 16S rRNA gene.