Insights into the Relationship between Intestinal Microbiota of the Aquaculture Worm <i>Sipunculus nudus</i> and Surrounding Sediments

Abstract

Sipunculus nudus is an important intertidal aquaculture species that can ingest organic matter from the surface sediment and shows a high transportation capacity in sediment. However, little is known about the influence of intertidal aquaculture species on the sediment microbial community and the exchange of microbiota between the intestine and the surrounding sediment. In this study, the microbial communities in the intestine of S. nudus and three kinds of surrounding sediments were analyzed using high-throughput sequencing of the 16S rRNA gene amplicon, and the relationships between different communities were examined. Principal coordinate analysis and ANOSIM/Adonis analysis showed that the microbial communities of worm intestine samples were significantly different from those of surrounding sediments (p S. nudus in the intertidal aquaculture zone.

Keywords

• <i>Sipunculus nudus</i>
• intertidal aquaculture
• intestinal microbes
• microbial exchange