Maroja L S, Clark M E, Harrison R G
Department of Ecology and Evolutionary Biology, Cornell University, Ithaca, NY 14853, USA.
Heredity (Edinb). 2008 Nov;101(5):435-44. doi: 10.1038/hdy.2008.75. Epub 2008 Aug 6.
Wolbachia are cytoplasmically inherited alpha-proteobacteria that can cause cytoplasmic incompatibility (CI) in insects. This incompatibility between sperm and egg is evident when uninfected females mate with infected males. Wolbachia-driven reproductive incompatibilities are of special interest because they may play a role in speciation. However, the presence of Wolbachia does not always imply incompatibility. The field crickets Gryllus firmus and G. pennsylvanicus exhibit a very clear unidirectional incompatibility and have been cited as a possible example of Wolbachia-induced CI. Here, we conduct curing experiments, intra- and interspecific crosses, cytological examination of Wolbachia in testes and Wolbachia quantifications through real-time PCR. All of our data strongly suggest that Wolbachia are not involved in the reproductive incompatibility between G. firmus and G. pennsylvanicus.
沃尔巴克氏体是一类通过细胞质遗传的α-变形菌，可在昆虫中引起细胞质不亲和性（CI）。当未感染的雌性交配感染的雄性时，精子与卵子之间的这种不亲和性就很明显。由沃尔巴克氏体驱动的生殖不亲和性特别令人感兴趣，因为它们可能在物种形成中发挥作用。然而，沃尔巴克氏体的存在并不总是意味着不亲和。田蟋蟀（Gryllus firmus）和宾夕法尼亚蟋蟀（G. pennsylvanicus）表现出非常明显的单向不亲和性，并被引为沃尔巴克氏体诱导的细胞质不亲和性的一个可能例子。在这里，我们进行了清除实验、种内和种间杂交、对睾丸中沃尔巴克氏体的细胞学检查以及通过实时PCR对沃尔巴克氏体进行定量分析。我们所有的数据都强烈表明，沃尔巴克氏体与田蟋蟀和宾夕法尼亚蟋蟀之间的生殖不亲和性无关。
