Animal-microbe interactions and the evolution of nervous systems

Abstract

Animals ubiquitously interact with environmental and symbiotic microbes, and the effects of these interactions on animal physiology are currently the subject of intense interest. Nevertheless, the influence of microbes on nervous system evolution has been largely ignored. We illustrate here how taking microbes into account might enrich our ideas about the evolution of nervous systems. For example, microbes are involved in animals’ communicative, defensive, predatory and dispersal behaviours, and have likely influenced the evolution of chemoand photosensory systems. In addition, we speculate that the need to regulate interactions with microbes at the epithelial surface may have contributed to the evolutionary internalization of the nervous system.