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Keystone taxa as drivers of microbiome structure and functioning

Nature Reviews Microbiology volume 16, pages 567–576 (2018)Cite this article

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Abstract

Microorganisms have a pivotal role in the functioning of ecosystems. Recent studies have shown that microbial communities harbour keystone taxa, which drive community composition and function irrespective of their abundance. In this Opinion article, we propose a definition of keystone taxa in microbial ecology and summarize over 200 microbial keystone taxa that have been identified in soil, plant and marine ecosystems, as well as in the human microbiome. We explore the importance of keystone taxa and keystone guilds for microbiome structure and functioning and discuss the factors that determine their distribution and activities.

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Fig. 1: Keystone taxa in the microbiome.
Fig. 2: Keystone taxa in microbial communities and the factors influencing their functioning in an environment.
Fig. 3: Characterizing and harnessing keystone taxa.

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Acknowledgements

The authors thank the referees, whose constructive comments and insightful suggestions greatly improved the quality of the manuscript. They also thank U. Kaufmann for help with a figure and C. Stanley for proofreading the manuscript. Work in the author’s laboratory was supported by the Swiss National Science Foundation (Grant No. 31003A_166079 awarded to M.G.A.v.d.H.).

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Nature Reviews Microbiology thanks Janet Jansson and the other anonymous reviewer(s) for their contribution to the peer review of this work.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Department of Agroecology and Environment, Agroscope, Zurich, Switzerland

    Samiran Banerjee, Klaus Schlaeppi & Marcel G. A. van der Heijden

  2. Institute of Plant Sciences, University of Bern, Bern, Switzerland

    Klaus Schlaeppi

  3. Department of Evolutionary Biology and Environmental Studies, University of Zurich, Zurich, Switzerland

    Marcel G. A. van der Heijden

  4. Institute of Environmental Biology, Faculty of Science, Utrecht University, Utrecht, Netherlands

    Marcel G. A. van der Heijden

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S.B. researched data for the article. S.B. and M.G.A.v.d.H made substantial contributions to the discussion of content and writing of the article. S.B, K.S. and M.G.A.v.d.H. reviewed and edited the manuscript before submission.

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Banerjee, S., Schlaeppi, K. & van der Heijden, M.G.A. Keystone taxa as drivers of microbiome structure and functioning. Nat Rev Microbiol 16, 567–576 (2018). https://doi.org/10.1038/s41579-018-0024-1

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