How does a carnivore survive on Bamboo? New Giant Panda findings....

Mickeroo

THought this might be of interest to a few. A new study has apparently come up with the answer of how the Giant Panda survives on a 99% bamboo diet even though it has a carnivores stomach.

Plant-eating animals tend to have longer intestines to aid in digesting fibrous material, a trait the black-and-white bears lack.

What's more, when the giant panda's genome was sequenced in 2009, scientists found that the creature lacks the genes for any known enzymes that would help break down cellulose, the plant fibers found in bamboo and other grasses.


This led researchers to speculate that panda intestines must have cellulose-munching bacteria that play a role in digestion. But previous attempts to find such bacteria in panda guts had failed.

The new study looked at gene sequences in the droppings from seven wild and eight captive giant pandas—a much bigger sample than what was used in previous panda-poop studies, said study leader Fuwen Wei, of the Chinese Academy of Science's Institute of Zoology in Beijing.

Wei and colleagues found that pandas' digestive tracts do in fact contain bacteria similar to those in the intestines of herbivores.

Full article avaiable on National Geographic.


There's also an interesting hypothesis in the article that Panda's only eat Bamboo because humans drove their habitation to higher altitudes and the diet change was a way of avoiding competition for food between themselves and other meat eaters such as Asiatic Black Bears.

steddyeddy

Thats very interesting thanks mickeroo. It reminds me of how anteaters dont generally generate their own stomach acid becuase the ants tat they eat contain enough formic acid to replicate the effects of hydrochloric acid!

I wonder does the bacteria-panda relationship count as symbiosis?

Adam Khor

Sorry if I missed it but, how does the panda obtain these bacteria?

Birdnuts

Mickeroo wrote: »

There's also an interesting hypothesis in the article that Panda's only eat Bamboo because humans drove their habitation to higher altitudes .

This would not suprise me - I read recently that the diet of Brown Bears in Europe was originally 80% meat but this fell to 40% by the Middle ages. Today its a mere 10%, all thanx to the malign influence of human activity on their availiable prey and range. There is also evidence that large carnivores are shrinking in seize across the world for similiar reasons:(

Mickeroo

Birdnuts wrote: »

This would not suprise me - I read recently that the diet of Brown Bears in Europe was originally 80% meat but this fell to 40% by the Middle ages. Today its a mere 10%, all thanx to the malign influence of human activity on their availiable prey and range. There is also evidence that large carnivores are shrinking in seize across the world for similiar reasons:(

Funny you should say that but I just read the other day that it's possible everything from primary producers up to larger animals are shrinking due to climate change.

Mickeroo

Adam Khor wrote: »

Sorry if I missed it but, how does the panda obtain these bacteria?

THe article says 7 of the 13 types of bacteria found are unique to pandas so I presume they just evolved in unison?

Adam Khor

Mickeroo wrote: »

THe article says 7 of the 13 types of bacteria found are unique to pandas so I presume they just evolved in unison?

Maybe...

I remember reading once about a kind of wasp that uses its own DNA to make actual viruses! o-o Imagine if the panda could do the same and make its own bacteria? Not saying that's what happens, just imagine...

Mickeroo

Adam Khor wrote: »

Maybe...

I remember reading once about a kind of wasp that uses its own DNA to make actual viruses! o-o Imagine if the panda could do the same and make its own bacteria? Not saying that's what happens, just imagine...

You never know. The regular bacteria in its stomach/intestine may have evolved into these ones since it's diet changed, bacteria evolve a lot faster than all us bigger animals.