Disentangling the causal relationship between rabbit growth and cecal microbiota through structural equation models
Ver/Abrir
Autor/a
Velasco-Galilea, María
Fecha de publicación
2022-12-19ISSN
0999-193X
Resumen
Background
The effect of the cecal microbiome on growth of rabbits that were fed under different regimes has been studied previously. However, the term “effect” carries a causal meaning that can be confounded because of potential genetic associations between the microbiome and production traits. Structural equation models (SEM) can help disentangle such a complex interplay by decomposing the effect on a production trait into direct host genetics effects and indirect host genetic effects that are exerted through microbiota effects. These indirect effects can be estimated via structural coefficients that measure the effect of the microbiota on growth while the effects of the host genetics are kept constant. In this study, we applied the SEM approach to infer causal relationships between the cecal microbiota and growth of rabbits fed under ad libitum (ADGAL) or restricted feeding (ADGR).
Results
We identified structural coefficients that are statistically different from 0 for 138 of the 946 operational taxonomic units (OTU) analyzed. However, only 15 and 38 of these 138 OTU had an effect greater than 0.2 phenotypic standard deviations (SD) on ADGAL and ADGR, respectively. Many of these OTU had a negative effect on both traits. The largest effects on ADGR were exerted by an OTU that is taxonomically assigned to the Desulfovibrio genus (− 1.929 g/d, CSS-normalized OTU units) and by an OTU that belongs to the Ruminococcaceae family (1.859 g/d, CSS-normalized OTU units). For ADGAL, the largest effect was from OTU that belong to the S24-7 family (− 1.907 g/d, CSS-normalized OTU units). In general, OTU that had a substantial effect had low to moderate estimates of heritability.
Conclusions
Disentangling how direct and indirect effects act on production traits is relevant to fully describe the processes of mediation but also to understand how these traits change before considering the application of an external intervention aimed at changing a given microbial composition by blocking/promoting the presence of a particular microorganism.
Tipo de documento
Artículo
Versión del documento
Versión publicada
Lengua
Inglés
Materias (CDU)
636 - Explotación y cría de animales. Cría del ganado y de animales domésticos
Páginas
14
Publicado por
BMC
Publicado en
Genetics Selection Evolution
Citación
Mora, Mónica, María Velasco-Galilea, Juan Pablo Sánchez, Yuliaxis Ramayo-Caldas, and Miriam Piles. 2022. "Disentangling The Causal Relationship Between Rabbit Growth And Cecal Microbiota Through Structural Equation Models". Genetics Selection Evolution 54 (1). doi:10.1186/s12711-022-00770-2.
Número del acuerdo de la subvención
EC/H2020/633531/EU/Adapting the feed, the animal and the feeding techniques to improve the efficiency and sustainability of monogastric livestock production systems/Feed-a-Gene
MICIU/Programa Estatal de I+D+I orientada a los retos de la sociedad/RTI2018-097610-R-I00/ES/MEJORA DE LA EFECTIVIDAD Y LA VIABILIDAD DE LOS PROGRAMAS DE SELECCION GENETICA PARA AUMENTAR LA EFICIENCIA ALIMENTARIA DE ESPECIES PROLIFICA/
MC/Programa Estatal para impulsar la investigación científico-técnica y su transferencia/PID2021-128173OR-C21/ES/RESPUESTA A LA SELECCION PARA EFICIENCIA ALIMENTARIA EN CONEJOS: PRODUCCION Y COMPORTAMIENTO. SISTEMAS DE VISION ARTIFICIAL PARA SU EVALUACION EN CERDOS Y CONEJOS/GENEF3
MICIU-FEDER/Programa Estatal de promoción del talento y su empleabilidad en I+D+I/RYC2019-027244-I/ES/Metagenomics and integrative biology tools to improve sustainable livestock systems/
Program
Genètica i Millora Animal
Este ítem aparece en la(s) siguiente(s) colección(ones)
- ARTICLES CIENTÍFICS [2549]
El ítem tiene asociados los siguientes ficheros de licencia:
Excepto si se señala otra cosa, la licencia del ítem se describe como http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/