Determining fecal bacterial profiles of a human-habituated wild chimpanzee population in Mahale Mountains National Park, Tanzania

Intestinal flora of wild chimpanzee has not been studied. Fecal flora analyses currently give insight to this environment. We collected 1 fecal sample from each of 12 human-habituated wild chimpanzees from Mahale Mountains National Park, 4 individuals in each of 3 age groups: juveniles, sub-adults, and adults. We analyzed samples for bacterial diversity using Terminal-Restriction Fragment Length Polymorphism (T-RFLP) of amplified 16S rDNA to determine bacterial diversity present. Between 1 and 14 terminal-restriction fragments (T-RFs) were observed in each sample. A total of 26 unique T-RFs were produced from the samples and ranged in size from 92 to 837 base pairs (bps). Twenty-four of these T-RFs corresponded to 5 bacterial phyla: Actinobacteria, Bacteroidetes, Firmicutes, Mollicutes, and Proteobacteria, as well as uncultured and unidentified bacteria. The remaining T-RFs corresponded solely to uncultured or unidentified bacteria. Firmicutes was the most common phylum, observed in 11 of the samples. Bacteroidetes and Mollicutes were the second-most common phyla, detected in 8 of the samples. Principal Components Analysis (PCA) revealed clustering of 10 of the 12 samples for two components, and 11 of the 12 samples for a third component, which accounted for 72.5% of the variation. Morisita indices were computed to compare T-RF profiles of two samples at a time, and were between 0 and 0.886. We conclude that there is more variation in the fecal flora of wild chimpanzees living in the same social group than previously expected. This suggests that factors other than diet and environment influence wild chimpanzee fecal bacterial profiles.