Oliveira Daniele S, Brito Nathália F, Franco Thiago A, Moreira Monica F, Leal Walter S, Melo Ana C A
Laboratório de Bioquímica e Biologia Molecular de Vetores, Instituto de Química, Universidade Federal do Rio de Janeiro, Rio de Janeiro, Brazil.
Instituto Nacional de Ciência e Tecnologia em Entomologia Molecular-CNPq, Rio de Janeiro, Brazil.
Front Physiol. 2018 Aug 23;9:1175. doi: 10.3389/fphys.2018.01175. eCollection 2018.
Olfactory proteins mediate a wide range of essential behaviors for insect survival. Odorant binding proteins (OBPs) are small soluble olfactory proteins involved in the transport of odor molecules (=odorants) through the sensillum lymph to odorant receptors, which are housed on the dendritic membrane of olfactory sensory neurons also known as olfactory receptor neurons. Thus, a better understanding of the role(s) of OBPs from , one of the main vectors of Chagas disease, may ultimately lead to new strategies for vector management. Here we aimed at functionally characterize OBPs from . Genes of interest were selected using conventional bioinformatics approaches and subsequent quantification by qPCR. We screened and estimated expression in different tissues of 17 from adults. These analyses showed that 11 were expressed in all tissues, whereas six genes were specific to antennae. Two OBP genes, and , were expressed in both male and female antennae thus suggesting that they might be involved in the recognition of semiochemicals mediating behaviors common to both sexes, such host finding (for a blood meal). Transcripts for and were enriched in female antennae and possibly involved in the detection of oviposition attractants or other semiochemicals mediating female-specific behaviors. By contrast, and might be involved in the reception of sex pheromones given that their transcripts were highly expressed in male antennae. To test this hypothesis, we silenced using RNAi and examined the sexual behavior of the phenotype. Indeed, adult males treated with spent significantly less time close to females as compared to controls. Additionally, docking analysis suggested that RproOBP27 binds to putative sex pheromones. We therefore concluded that RproOBP27 might be a pheromone-binding protein.
嗅觉蛋白介导昆虫生存所需的多种基本行为。气味结合蛋白（OBPs）是一类可溶性小嗅觉蛋白，参与气味分子（即气味剂）通过感器淋巴向气味受体的转运，气味受体位于嗅觉感觉神经元（也称为嗅觉受体神经元）的树突膜上。因此，更好地了解恰加斯病主要传播媒介之一的[某种昆虫]的OBPs的作用，最终可能会带来新的媒介管理策略。在此，我们旨在对[某种昆虫]的OBPs进行功能表征。使用传统生物信息学方法选择感兴趣的基因，并随后通过qPCR进行定量分析。我们筛选并估计了17个[某种昆虫]成虫不同组织中的表达情况。这些分析表明，11个[基因]在所有组织中均有表达，而6个[基因]仅在触角中表达。两个OBP基因，[基因名称1]和[基因名称2]，在雄性和雌性触角中均有表达，因此表明它们可能参与介导两性共同行为的化学信号的识别，如宿主寻找（为了获取血餐）。[基因名称3]和[基因名称4]的转录本在雌性触角中富集，可能参与产卵引诱剂或其他介导雌性特异性行为的化学信号的检测。相比之下，[基因名称5]和[基因名称6]可能参与性信息素的接收，因为它们的转录本在雄性触角中高度表达。为了验证这一假设，我们使用RNAi使[基因名称5]沉默，并检查该表型的性行为。事实上，与对照组相比，用[基因名称5]处理的成年雄性与雌性接近的时间明显减少。此外，对接分析表明RproOBP27与假定的性信息素结合。因此，我们得出结论，RproOBP27可能是一种性信息素结合蛋白。
