The fermentative ability of primate gut microbiome under "humanization"

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This project aims to examine and compare the fermentative ability of gut microbiome harbored by the great apes and humans. Through comparison, this project explores the relative importance of phylogeny and diet in shaping hominoid's fermentative ability and gut microbiome.The main achievement of this year is the field trips to Sabah Malaysia - the natural habitat of orangutan Pongo pygmaeus. During the trip, I successfully tracked 11 orangutan individuals to collect their fresh feces and conducted the in vitro fermentation assay. The results of in vitro fermentation assay were, however, opposite to our expectation - there was no significant difference in the fermentative ability between the captive and wild orangutans. I will conduct DNA experiment to determine the gut microbiota.In addition to that, I collected fecal samples from three sympatric primate species (long-tailed macaques, red leaf monkey and pig-tailed macaques) to understand how sharing of habitat/diet may affect the gut microbiome of non-human primates.