The honey bee triad: a comprehensive catalogue of phages in the Apis mellifera gut microbiome

A metagenomic study of 450 virus-enriched honey bee gut samples from 63 hives across eight European countries, three seasons and three gut sections catalogues a diverse phageome, including many phages that appear to belong to novel taxa and a core set of 97 highly prevalent phages. It also identifies potential auxiliary metabolic genes, such as a sulfur metabolism gene carried by predominantly temperate phages that likely infect mutualistic honey bee core bacteria.