Analysis on the relationships between feeding habit and gastrointestinal microbiota of small mammals

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Symbiotic microorganisms in mammalian gastrointestinal tract are unimaginably diverse and contribute on the nutrition, but those of the small mammals are not well understood. To investigate the relationships between the feeding habit and gastrointestinal microbiota of the small mammals, we identified the microbiota by using molecular ecological analyses with 16S rRNA clone libraries. As a result, we found that 1) biodiversity of microbiota in a forestomach of herbivorous rodents is very poor, indicating that the forestomach has no similar roles as large plant-eating mammals, 2) biodiversity of microbiota in the cecum of small rodents is extensively rich, suggesting that the microbiota has an important role for food digestion and nutrition, 3) biodiversity of microbiota in lower digestive tract of mole is also very high, but shows a very discriminative composition ratio, even in the order level, compared to those of other mammals.