Michelle Sauther

About

Professor Michelle Sauther is engaged in the conservation biology of ring-tailed lemurs, focusing on how human-induced habitat changes affect their health and ecology. Since 2003, she has led a survey on the health and disease ecology of wild ring-tailed lemurs at the Beza Mahafaly Special Reserve. Her research involves capturing and examining lemurs from protected reserves and anthropogenically altered habitats to assess nutritional and disease parameters. The studies follow strict animal handling protocols and international conservation regulations. Professor Sauther's work investigates the impact of habitat fragmentation and deforestation on lemur feeding ecology, health, and behavior, including interactions with domestic animals as habitats degrade. Her team conducts detailed health exams measuring body fat, growth, dental health, nutrition, and parasitic infections, revealing patterns such as dental abscesses, alopecia, and wounds related to mating behaviors. This research highlights the strong connection between lemur behavior and biology, contributing valuable insights into the conservation and management of this endangered species.

Research topics

• Biology
• Zoology
• Ecology
• Geography

Selected publications

• Evolutionary trends in host physiology outweigh dietary niche in structuring primate gut microbiomes

  The ISME Journal · 2018-07-11 · 395 citations

  articleOpen access

  Over the past decade several studies have reported that the gut microbiomes of mammals with similar dietary niches exhibit similar compositional and functional traits. However, these studies rely heavily on samples from captive individuals and often confound host phylogeny, gut morphology, and diet. To more explicitly test the influence of host dietary niche on the mammalian gut microbiome we use 16S rRNA gene amplicon sequencing and shotgun metagenomics to compare the gut microbiota of 18 speci…

  PublisherOA PDFDOI

• Biodiversity of protists and nematodes in the wild nonhuman primate gut

  The ISME Journal · 2019-11-12 · 73 citations

  articleOpen access

  Documenting the natural diversity of eukaryotic organisms in the nonhuman primate (NHP) gut is important for understanding the evolution of the mammalian gut microbiome, its role in digestion, health and disease, and the consequences of anthropogenic change on primate biology and conservation. Despite the ecological significance of gut-associated eukaryotes, little is known about the factors that influence their assembly and diversity in mammals. In this study, we used an 18S rRNA gene fragment…

  PublisherOA PDFDOI

• Mycobacterium leprae genomes from naturally infected nonhuman primates

  PLoS neglected tropical diseases · 2018-01-30 · 68 citations

  articleOpen access

  Leprosy is caused by the bacterial pathogens Mycobacterium leprae and Mycobacterium lepromatosis. Apart from humans, animals such as nine-banded armadillos in the Americas and red squirrels in the British Isles are naturally infected with M. leprae. Natural leprosy has also been reported in certain nonhuman primates, but it is not known whether these occurrences are due to incidental infections by human M. leprae strains or by M. leprae strains specific to nonhuman primates. In this study, compl…

  PublisherOA PDFDOI

• Factors influencing terrestriality in primates of the Americas and Madagascar

  Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences · 2022 · 38 citations

  Among mammals, the order Primates is exceptional in having a high taxonomic richness in which the taxa are arboreal, semiterrestrial, or terrestrial. Although habitual terrestriality is pervasive among the apes and African and Asian monkeys (catarrhines), it is largely absent among monkeys of the Americas (platyrrhines), as well as galagos, lemurs, and lorises (strepsirrhines), which are mostly arboreal. Numerous ecological drivers and species-specific factors are suggested to set the conditions…

  PublisherOA PDFDOI

• Genetic wealth, population health: Major histocompatibility complex variation in captive and wild ring‐tailed lemurs (<i>Lemur catta</i>)

  Ecology and Evolution · 2017-08-17 · 27 citations

  articleOpen access

  Abstract Across species, diversity at the major histocompatibility complex ( MHC ) is critical to individual disease resistance and, hence, to population health; however, MHC diversity can be reduced in small, fragmented, or isolated populations. Given the need for comparative studies of functional genetic diversity, we investigated whether MHC diversity differs between populations which are open, that is experiencing gene flow, versus populations which are closed, that is isolated from other po…

  PublisherOA PDFDOI

Recent grants

• Physiological and Behavioral Responses to a Temperate Primate Niche Using a Strepsirrhine Model

  NSF · $245k · 2017–2020

• Doctoral Dissertation Improvement: Challenging Assumptions of Dental Senescence Using a Primate Framework

  NSF · $25k · 2012–2015

Frequent coauthors

• Frank P. Cuozzo

  University of Pretoria

  71 shared

• Robert W. Sussman

  18 shared

• Lisa Gould

  17 shared

• Andrea L. Baden

  The Graduate Center, CUNY

  14 shared

• Ibrahim Antho Youssouf Jacky

  University of Toliara

  13 shared

• Richard R. Lawler

  12 shared

• Adrian S. W. Tordiffe

  University of Pretoria

  10 shared

• Peter M. Kappeler

  German Primate Center

  9 shared

Similar researchers at University of Colorado Boulder

• Matt Sponheimerh-70
• Scott Ortmanh-38
• Sharon DeWitteh-34