Sex‐Specific Involvement of Gut Microbiota in Behavioral and Endocrine Responses to Chronic Predator Odor in Brandt's Voles

Nov 11, 2025Integrative zoology

Gut Microbiota May Influence Behavior and Hormone Responses to Chronic Predator Odor Differently in Male and Female Brandt's Voles

AI simplified

Gut-Brain Axis on OpenScience ↗PubMed ↗DOI ↗OA ↗

Abstract

Repeated exposure to cat feces odor for 18 days increased anxiety-like behaviors and basal HPA axis activity in Brandt's voles.

Chronic exposure to predator cues led to heightened anxiety-like responses in both male and female voles.
Males adapted to repeated predator cues by reducing freezing and alerting behaviors, while females maintained consistent concealing strategies.
Gut microbiota composition was significantly altered in females exposed to predator cues, but not in males.
Cecal microbiota transplantation from female voles exposed to predator cues increased anxiety-like behaviors in naive recipients, indicating a potential role of gut microbiota in stress responses.
No significant behavioral or physiological changes were observed in male recipients after microbiota transplantation.

AI simplified

Predator cues have profound impacts on the behavior and physiology of prey animals. However, the mechanisms underlying stress responses induced by chronic exposure to predator cues in mammals, particularly the role of the gut microbiota, remain insufficiently understood. This study investigated how gut microbiota contributes to behavioral and physiological responses in Brandt's voles (Lasiopodomys brandtii) under chronic predator odor exposure. Adult voles were repeatedly exposed to cat feces odor (CO) for 18 days (1 h/day), followed by behavioral tests to assess anti-predator and anxiety-like behaviors, hormonal measurements to evaluate basal hypothalamic-pituitary-adrenal (HPA) axis activity, and 16S rRNA sequencing to analyze gut microbiota composition. The results showed that repeated CO exposure increased anxiety-like behaviors and basal HPA axis activity in both sexes. However, anti-predator behaviors exhibited sex-specific responses: Males were habituated to repeated CO exposure by reducing freezing and alerting behaviors, whereas females consistently displayed concealing strategies, reflecting different adaptive strategies to prolonged predator threats. While CO exposure did not alter the α-diversity of gut microbiota, it significantly affected the β-diversity in females, including a reduction in the relative abundance of Treponema and Quinella. Cecal microbiota transplantation from female CO-exposed voles to naive recipients increased anxiety-like behaviors and basal HPA levels but did not alter anti-predator behaviors in the recipients. In contrast, male recipients showed no significant behavioral or physiological changes. These findings suggest that gut microbiota is involved in regulating anxiety-like behavior and HPA axis activity in female voles but has a limited regulating role in male voles.

Full Text

Full text is available at the source.

View full text ↗

Sex‐Specific Involvement of Gut Microbiota in Behavioral and Endocrine Responses to Chronic Predator Odor in Brandt's Voles

Abstract

Full Text

You found one interesting study. We’ll send the next 7.

what lands in your inbox each week:

Recent issues from the gut-brain axis brief