Gut microbiomes are largely unchanged when exposed to their amphibian host's latitudinally variable upper thermal limit.

Abstract

Climate change will increase the frequency and severity of temperature extremes. Links between host thermal physiology and their gut microbiota suggest that organisms' responses to future climates may be mediated by their microbiomes, raising the question of how the thermal environment influences the microbiome itself. Vertebrate gut microbiomes influence the physiological plasticity of their hosts via effects on immunity, metabolism, and nutrient uptake. The gut microbiota of ectothermic vertebrates in particular are responsive to long-term, sub-lethal gradual increases in environmental temperature. Whether and how the gut microbiota respond to brief exposure to temperatures at the upper limit of host physiological tolerance (CT_max) is poorly understood but could have downstream effects on host fitness. We assayed the CT_max of wood frogs (Lithobates sylvaticus) from 15 populations across a 10° latitudinal gradient. We then characterized the gut microbiota of juveniles at two time points following exposure to CT_max. Frogs from higher latitudes had lower thermal tolerance (lower CT_max) than those from lower latitudes. Unexpectedly, exposure to upper survivable temperature had little to no detectable effect on the frogs' microbiota richness, stability, or composition. Instead, we found a strong effect of time in which frogs kept in recovery conditions for four days had less diverse, but more stable gut microbiota than those that had recovered for only one day, regardless of CT_max exposure. We conclude that while wood frogs from higher latitudes have reduced thermal tolerances than those from lower latitudes, their microbial communities are largely unaffected by brief exposure to high temperatures at the edge of their physiological limits.