Rao Qiong, Wu Huiming
Wei Sheng Wu Xue Bao. 2014 Jul 4;54(7):728-36.
In nature, many insects, especially sap-feeding insects, harbor nutritional bacterial symbionts, which are called obligate endosymbionts. These bacteria co-evolved with their hosts for millions of years. Obligate endosymbionts are commonly found in specialized organs, named bacteriomes or mycetomes that consist of a number of insect's cells (bacteriocytes or mycetocytes). Obligate endosymbionts strictly maternally inherited, providing essential amino acids to the hosts, and relating to survival, reproduction and evolution of the insects. Because of enriched nutritional environment, compared to those free-living bacteria, the genomes of obligate endosymbionts have different characteristics, such as genome size, GC content, and gene deletion. Although the genomes of many insect endosymbionts have been carefully analysis, the gene functions of endosymbionts and the interactions between endosymbionts/hosts and endosymbionts remain unknown. Thus, to provide an insight into the co-evolution of endosymbionts and their hosts, further studies of endosymbionts at genetic level are required.
在自然界中，许多昆虫，尤其是吸食树液的昆虫，都携带着营养细菌共生体，这些共生体被称为专性内共生菌。这些细菌与它们的宿主共同进化了数百万年。专性内共生菌通常存在于特殊的器官中，这些器官被称为菌瘤或含菌细胞团，由许多昆虫细胞（细菌细胞或含菌细胞）组成。专性内共生菌严格通过母系遗传，为宿主提供必需氨基酸，并与昆虫的生存、繁殖和进化相关。由于营养环境丰富，与那些自由生活的细菌相比，专性内共生菌的基因组具有不同的特征，如基因组大小、GC含量和基因缺失。尽管许多昆虫内共生菌的基因组已经得到了仔细分析，但内共生菌的基因功能以及内共生菌/宿主之间和内共生菌之间的相互作用仍然未知。因此，为了深入了解内共生菌与其宿主的共同进化，需要在基因水平上对内共生菌进行进一步研究。
