Key Laboratory of Pollinating Insect Biology, Ministry of Agriculture/Institute of Apicultural Research, Chinese Academy of Agricultural Science, Beijing, China.
J Proteome Res. 2011 Jul 1;10(7):3246-60. doi: 10.1021/pr2002808. Epub 2011 Jun 13.
Honeybees have evolved an intricate system of chemical communication to regulate their complex social interactions. Specific proteins involved in odorant detection most likely supported this chemical communication. Odorant reception takes place mainly in the antennae within hairlike structures called olfactory sensilla. Antennal proteomes of sexually mature drone and forager worker bees (an age group of bees assigned to perform field tasks) were compared using two-dimensional electrophoresis, mass spectrometry, quantitative real-time polymerase chain reaction, and bioinformatics. Sixty-one differentially expressed proteins were identified in which 67% were highly upregulated in the drones' antennae whereas only 33% upregulated in the worker bees' antennae. The antennae of the worker bees strongly expressed carbohydrate and energy metabolism and molecular transporters signifying a strong demand for metabolic energy and odorant binding proteins for their foraging activities and other olfactory responses, while proteins related to fatty acid metabolism, antioxidation, and protein folding were strongly upregulated in the drones' antennae as an indication of the importance for the detection and degradation of sex pheromones during queen identification for mating. On the basis of both groups of altered antenna proteins, carbohydrate metabolism and energy production and molecular transporters comprised more than 80% of the functional enrichment analysis and 45% of the constructed biological interaction networks (BIN), respectively. This suggests these two protein families play crucial roles in the antennal olfactory function of sexually mature drone and forager worker bees. Several key node proteins in the BIN were validated at the transcript level. This first global proteomic comparative analysis of antennae reveals sex-biased protein expression in both bees, indicating that odorant response mechanisms are sex-specific because of natural selection for different olfactory functions. To the best of our knowledge, this result further provides extensive insight into the expression of the proteins in the antennae of drone and worker honeybees and adds vital information to the previous findings. It also provides a new angle for future detailed functional analysis of the antennae of the honeybee castes.
蜜蜂已经进化出一种复杂的化学通讯系统来调节它们复杂的社会互动。参与气味检测的特定蛋白质很可能支持这种化学通讯。气味的接收主要发生在触角内，触角内有毛发状结构称为嗅觉感受器。使用二维电泳、质谱、定量实时聚合酶链反应和生物信息学比较了性成熟雄蜂和觅食工蜂（被分配执行野外任务的蜜蜂年龄组）的触角蛋白质组。在雄蜂触角中鉴定出 61 种差异表达蛋白，其中 67%高度上调，而在工蜂触角中仅上调 33%。工蜂的触角强烈表达碳水化合物和能量代谢以及分子转运蛋白，表明它们对代谢能量和气味结合蛋白有强烈的需求，以支持它们的觅食活动和其他嗅觉反应，而与脂肪酸代谢、抗氧化和蛋白质折叠相关的蛋白则在雄蜂的触角中强烈上调，表明它们在识别求偶时对性信息素的检测和降解非常重要。基于两组改变的触角蛋白，碳水化合物代谢和能量产生以及分子转运蛋白分别占功能富集分析的 80%以上和构建的生物相互作用网络 (BIN)的 45%以上。这表明这两个蛋白质家族在性成熟雄蜂和觅食工蜂的触角嗅觉功能中发挥着关键作用。在 BIN 中的几个关键节点蛋白在转录水平上得到了验证。这是首次对触角进行的全蛋白质组比较分析揭示了两性在蜜蜂中的偏性蛋白表达，表明由于自然选择的不同嗅觉功能，气味反应机制是具有性别特异性的。据我们所知，这一结果进一步深入了解了雄蜂和工蜂触角蛋白的表达，并为之前的发现提供了重要信息。它还为未来对蜜蜂不同等级的触角进行详细的功能分析提供了一个新的角度。
