Emerging infectious diseases threaten biodiversity and human health. Many emerging pathogens have aquatic life stages and all immersed substrates have biofilms on their surface, i.e., communities of microorganisms producing a gelatinous matrix. However, the outcome of the interactions between environmental biofilms and pathogens is poorly understood. Here we demonstrate that biofilms reduce the survival of the most impactful pathogen for vertebrate diversity, the invasive chytrid fungus Batrachochytrium dendrobatidis. Effects on its zoospores varied with biofilm composition in controlled settings and biofilm compositional variation also coincided with divergent impacts of chytridiomycosis on amphibian populations in nature. Our results suggest that biofilms form a biotic component of ecosystem resistance to Batrachochytrium dendrobatidis by reducing environmental transmission, and that they could be used to develop nature-based technologies to limit the impacts and spread of this invasive chytrid fungus. Our study warrants further research into the interactions between environmental biofilms and pathogenic and/or invasive micro-organisms.

中文翻译：

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生物膜使 Batrachochytrium dendrobatidis 的自由生活阶段失活，Batrachochytrium dendrobatidis 是脊椎动物多样性最具破坏性的病原体


新出现的传染病威胁着生物多样性和人类健康。许多新出现的病原体具有水生生活阶段，所有浸没的基质表面都有生物膜，即产生凝胶状基质的微生物群落。然而，人们对环境生物膜和病原体之间相互作用的结果知之甚少。在这里，我们证明生物膜会降低对脊椎动物多样性影响最大的病原体，即侵袭性壶菌 Batrachochytrium dendrobatidis 的存活率。在受控环境中，生物膜组成对其游动孢子的影响各不相同，生物膜组成的变化也与壶菌病对自然界两栖动物种群的不同影响相吻合。我们的结果表明，生物膜通过减少环境传递，形成了生态系统对 Batrachochytrium dendrobatidis 的抵抗力的生物成分，并且它们可用于开发基于自然的技术，以限制这种入侵性壶菌的影响和传播。我们的研究需要进一步研究环境生物膜与病原和/或侵入性微生物之间的相互作用。