Xu Letian, Lu Min, Xu Dandan, Chen Li, Sun Jianghua
State Key Laboratory of Integrated Management of Pest Insects and Rodents, Institute of Zoology, Chinese Academy of Sciences, 1 Beichen West Road, Chaoyang District, Beijing 100101, China; TEDA Institute of Biological Sciences and Biotechnology, Nankai University, TEDA, Tianjin 300457, China; Key Laboratory of Molecular Microbiology and Technology, Ministry of Education, Tianjin 300071, China.
State Key Laboratory of Integrated Management of Pest Insects and Rodents, Institute of Zoology, Chinese Academy of Sciences, 1 Beichen West Road, Chaoyang District, Beijing 100101, China.
J Insect Physiol. 2016 Dec;95:110-117. doi: 10.1016/j.jinsphys.2016.09.014. Epub 2016 Sep 28.
Gut microbiota are widely involved in insect biology, and many factors can influence the microbiota in guts and frass. Dendroctonus valens is a very destructive forest pest in China, and the mass-attacking behavior is regulated by several semiochemicals, including verbenone, a multifunctional pheromone. The beetle harbors a variety of bacteria in its guts and frass and some of them are capable of verbenone production. D. valens is characterized by monogamy and female-initiated attacking behavior. Whether the bacterial communities fluctuate according to sex, and whether the variation influences the verbenone production, remains to be determined. In this study, the bacterial microbiota in D. valens guts and frass were analyzed, and verbenone production by their crude bacterial suspensions was compared in vitro. Bacterial diversity in female frass is more abundant compared to male frass, and the percentages and total amounts of main genera like Lactococcus and Pseudomonas in female frass are significantly higher than those in male frass. The verbenone produced by the female frass suspension is significantly higher than male frass. This study presents a comprehensive comparison of bacterial communities in guts and frass between both sexes of D. valens, highlighting the potential significance of female frass microbiota in verbenone production.
肠道微生物群广泛参与昆虫生物学过程，许多因素会影响肠道和粪便中的微生物群。红脂大小蠹是中国一种极具破坏性的森林害虫，其群体攻击行为受多种信息化学物质调控，包括多功能信息素马鞭草烯酮。这种甲虫的肠道和粪便中含有多种细菌，其中一些能够产生马鞭草烯酮。红脂大小蠹具有一夫一妻制和雌性发起攻击行为的特点。细菌群落是否随性别波动，以及这种变化是否影响马鞭草烯酮的产生，仍有待确定。在本研究中，分析了红脂大小蠹肠道和粪便中的细菌微生物群，并在体外比较了其粗细菌悬液产生马鞭草烯酮的情况。与雄性粪便相比，雌性粪便中的细菌多样性更为丰富，雌性粪便中乳酸乳球菌和假单胞菌等主要菌属的百分比和总量显著高于雄性粪便。雌性粪便悬液产生的马鞭草烯酮明显高于雄性粪便。本研究全面比较了红脂大小蠹雌雄两性肠道和粪便中的细菌群落，突出了雌性粪便微生物群在马鞭草烯酮产生中的潜在重要性。
