IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/plo/pcbi00/1008392.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

Stochastic colonization of hosts with a finite lifespan can drive individual host microbes out of equilibrium

Author

Listed:
  • Román Zapién-Campos
  • Michael Sieber
  • Arne Traulsen

Abstract

Macroorganisms are inhabited by microbial communities that often change through the lifespan of an individual. One of the factors contributing to this change is colonization from the environment. The colonization of initially microbe-free hosts is particularly interesting, as their microbiome depends entirely on microbes of external origin. We present a mathematical model of this process with a particular emphasis on the effect of ecological drift and a finite host lifespan. Our results indicate the host lifespan becomes especially relevant for short-living organisms (e.g. Caenorhabditis elegans, Drosophila melanogaster, and Danio rerio). In this case, alternative microbiome states (often called enterotypes), the coexistence of microbe-free and colonized hosts, and a reduced probability of colonization can be observed in our model. These results unify multiple reported observations around colonization and suggest that no selective or deterministic drivers are necessary to explain them.Author summary: Microbial communities are prevalent not only in the environment but also in hosts. Although the drivers of environmental microbiomes have been studied extensively, less is known about the drivers distinguishing a host environment. Recent experimental observations have highlighted the influence of ecological drift in hosts with short lifespan, including model organisms like C. elegans, D. melanogaster and D. rerio. We have developed a theoretical model to study the effect of a finite host lifespan on relevant observables of the microbiome, including the microbial load, probability of colonization of a microbial taxon, and distribution of microbiome composition in a host population. Although we focus on a case free of any selection, our results indicate the possible coexistence of hosts with alternative microbiome composition, and to a larger extent the coexistence of colonized and microbe-free hosts. A quantitative description is provided.

Suggested Citation

  • Román Zapién-Campos & Michael Sieber & Arne Traulsen, 2020. "Stochastic colonization of hosts with a finite lifespan can drive individual host microbes out of equilibrium," PLOS Computational Biology, Public Library of Science, vol. 16(11), pages 1-20, November.
    • Handle: RePEc:plo:pcbi00:1008392
    DOI: 10.1371/journal.pcbi.1008392
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: https://journals.plos.org/ploscompbiol/article?id=10.1371/journal.pcbi.1008392
    Download Restriction: no
    File URL: https://journals.plos.org/ploscompbiol/article/file?id=10.1371/journal.pcbi.1008392&type=printable
    Download Restriction: no
    File URL: https://libkey.io/10.1371/journal.pcbi.1008392?utm_source=ideas
    LibKey link: if access is restricted and if your library uses this service, LibKey will redirect you to where you can use your library subscription to access this item
    ---><---

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Kyriakidis, E. G., 1994. "Stationary probabilities for a simple immigration-birth-death process under the influence of total catastrophes," Statistics & Probability Letters, Elsevier, vol. 20(3), pages 239-240, June.
    2. Randall J. Swift, 2001. "Transient probabilities for a simple birth-death-immigration process under the influence of total catastrophes," International Journal of Mathematics and Mathematical Sciences, Hindawi, vol. 25, pages 1-4, January.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Vijay Rajan Lumb & Indra Rani, 2022. "Analytically simple solution to discrete-time queue with catastrophes, balking and state-dependent service," International Journal of System Assurance Engineering and Management, Springer;The Society for Reliability, Engineering Quality and Operations Management (SREQOM),India, and Division of Operation and Maintenance, Lulea University of Technology, Sweden, vol. 13(2), pages 783-817, April.
    2. Economou, Antonis & Fakinos, Demetrios, 2003. "A continuous-time Markov chain under the influence of a regulating point process and applications in stochastic models with catastrophes," European Journal of Operational Research, Elsevier, vol. 149(3), pages 625-640, September.
    3. Antonis Economou & Athanasia Manou, 2013. "Equilibrium balking strategies for a clearing queueing system in alternating environment," Annals of Operations Research, Springer, vol. 208(1), pages 489-514, September.
    4. Di Crescenzo, A. & Giorno, V. & Nobile, A.G. & Ricciardi, L.M., 2008. "A note on birth-death processes with catastrophes," Statistics & Probability Letters, Elsevier, vol. 78(14), pages 2248-2257, October.
    5. Economou, Antonis, 2003. "On the control of a compound immigration process through total catastrophes," European Journal of Operational Research, Elsevier, vol. 147(3), pages 522-529, June.
    6. Antonio Crescenzo & Virginia Giorno & Balasubramanian Krishna Kumar & Amelia G. Nobile, 2012. "A Double-ended Queue with Catastrophes and Repairs, and a Jump-diffusion Approximation," Methodology and Computing in Applied Probability, Springer, vol. 14(4), pages 937-954, December.
    7. Spiros Dimou & Antonis Economou, 2013. "The Single Server Queue with Catastrophes and Geometric Reneging," Methodology and Computing in Applied Probability, Springer, vol. 15(3), pages 595-621, September.

    More about this item

    Statistics

    Access and download statistics

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:plo:pcbi00:1008392. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: ploscompbiol (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://journals.plos.org/ploscompbiol/ .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.