Host phylogeny and host ecology structure the mammalian gut microbiota at different taxonomic scales

Table 3 Host taxonomy and dietary guild shape the gut microbiotas of African herbivores

Analysis	Host factors	Bray-Curtis (% variance explained)	Jaccard (% variance explained)	Weighted Unifrac (% variance explained)	Unweighted Unifrac (% variance explained)
Across all host study species (11 sp.) (N = 165)	Host family	22.34, p = 0.001	20.62, p = 0.001	25.90, p = 0.001	24.29, p = 0.001
	Host dietary guild	11.20, p = 0.001	10.17, p = 0.001	10.04, p = 0.001	10.30, p = 0.001
	sample month	7.39, p = 0.001	6.78, p = 0.001	9.90, p = 0.001	7.68, p = 0.001
Across bovids (7 sp.) (N = 122)	Host dietary guild	18.26, p = 0.001	15.91, p = 0.001	18.35, p = 0.001	16.77, p = 0.001
	Host species	15.16, p = 0.001	13.38, p = 0.001	8.23, p = 0.001	12.16, p = 0.001
	sample month	7.56, p = 0.001	7.03, p = 0.001	7.59, p = 0.001	7.17, p = 0.001

Shown are the R² values (% variance explained) and p-values for PERMANOVA tests (y ~ sample month + host dietary guild + host taxonomy) based on 4 types of distance matrices. Bray-Curtis and Weighted Unifrac distance matrices take into consideration the proportions of bacterial taxa, while Jaccard and unweighted Unifrac take into account only their presence or absence. Both Unifrac distances account for phylogenetic relatedness among bacterial types. Significant p-values (α = 0.05) are bolded

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