School of Marine and Tropical Biology, Centre for Comparative Genomics, James Cook University, Townsville, Queensland 4811, Australia.
Dev Comp Immunol. 2010 Jul;34(7):705-9. doi: 10.1016/j.dci.2010.02.002. Epub 2010 Feb 16.
Social bees and other insects are frequently parasitized by a large range of different microorganisms. Among these is Crithidia bombi (Kinetoplastida: Trypanosomatidae), a common gut parasite of bumblebees, Bombus spp. (Insecta: Apidae). Bumblebees are important pollinators in commercial and natural environments. There are clear detrimental effects of C. bombi infections on the fitness of bumblebees. However, little has been known about how the bee's immune system responds to infections with trypanosome parasites. Here, we study the immune response of Bombus terrestris on infection by C. bombi. We measured the expression of four immune-related genes (Hemomucin, MyD88, Relish, and TEP7) using RT-qPCR in adult B. terrestris workers that were either healthy or infected with the trypanosome parasite C. bombi. The potential recognition gene Hemomucin was significantly upregulated in the infected bees. Further, there was substantial and significant variation in all four genes among different bumblebee colonies irrespective of infection status.
社会性蜜蜂和其他昆虫经常被多种不同的微生物寄生。其中包括 Bombus spp.（昆虫纲：蜜蜂科）肠道寄生虫 Crithidia bombi（动基体目：锥虫科）。大黄蜂是商业和自然环境中重要的传粉媒介。C. bombi 感染对大黄蜂的适应性有明显的不利影响。然而，人们对蜜蜂的免疫系统如何对锥虫寄生虫感染作出反应知之甚少。在这里，我们研究了 Bombus terrestris 感染 C. bombi 后的免疫反应。我们使用 RT-qPCR 测量了健康或感染锥虫寄生虫 C. bombi 的成年 B. terrestris 工蜂中四种与免疫相关的基因（Hemomucin、MyD88、Relish 和 TEP7）的表达。潜在的识别基因 Hemomucin 在感染的蜜蜂中显著上调。此外，无论感染状况如何，四个基因在不同的大黄蜂群体中都存在大量且显著的变化。
