Fig. 2

Predicted alpha-diversity plots by linear mixed model. Alpha-diversity in water and host-microbial communities over time and among treatments is predicted using the linear mixed model. The richness/evenness ratio were considered as response variables, the fixed effects were defined by time and cadmium concentration (in water and liver), and tanks were taken as random effects. Over time, the predicted alpha diversity in host microbial communities (skin, gut) highlights stable trends of the Control group compared to the treatments. However, all groups of the water microbial communities decrease overtime. Constant cadmium regime (CC) is in orange, variable cadmium regime (CV) is in yellow, and control (control) is in green