What determines the diversity of pathogenic microbial communities in nature?

Anna-Liisa Laine

Department of Evolutionary Biology and Environmental Studies, University of Zurich, Switzerland

Link to seminar:  https://umontpellier-fr.zoom.us/webinar/register/WN_LrcObYbjSrKU4ihhn6zPcQ

Pathogens are prevalent across all ecosystems and they may have strong negative effects on their hosts. Hence, there is a pressing need to understand determinants of risks of infection and how these evolve. To date, host-pathogen interactions have been largely viewed within the ‘one host-one parasite’ framework although in reality the same host may be attacked by a myriad of pathogenic microbes. As molecular tools have become increasingly available for the study of parasites, we now know that a single host individual can support a highly diverse pathogen community. However, remarkably little is known about the factors that determine which pathogens co-occur within the same host individual, how they interact and what this diversity means for disease ecology. In my talk I will present case studies of within host pathogen strain and species diversity, and what we know to date of the determinants of this diversity.

Recent publications:        

Sallinen, S., Norberg, A., Susi, H. & Laine, A.-L. 2020. Intraspecific host variation plays a key role in virus community assembly. Nature Communications, 11,5610 (2020). doi: 10.1038/s41467-020-19273-z

Halliday. F. W., Penczykowski, R., Barres, B., Eck, J., Numminen, E. & Laine, A.-L. 2020. Facilitative priority effects drive parasite assembly under coinfection. Nature Ecology & Evolution 4: 1510–152. doi: 10.1038/s41559-020-01289-9

Laine, A.-L., Barrès, B., Numminen, E. & Sirén, J. 2019. Variable opportunities for outcrossing result in hotspots of novel genetic variation in a pathogen metapopulation. eLife, 8:e47091. doi:10.7554/eLife.47091

https://lainelab.net/

Watch previous seminars on our YouTube channel: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCrX4IsZ8WIFcDa0ZmC7rcQg