Sontowski Rebekka, Gerth Michael, Richter Sandy, Gruppe Axel, Schlegel Martin, van Dam Nicole M, Bleidorn Christoph
German Centre for Integrative Biodiversity Research (iDiv) Halle-Jena-Leipzig, 04103 Leipzig, Germany.
Institute of Biodiversity, Friedrich-Schiller-University, 07743 Jena, Germany.
Insects. 2020 Dec 7;11(12):867. doi: 10.3390/insects11120867.
Endosymbionts are widely distributed in insects and can strongly affect their host ecology. The common green lacewing () is a neuropteran insect which is widely used in biological pest control. However, their endosymbionts and their interactions with their hosts have not been very well studied. Therefore, we screened for endosymbionts in natural and laboratory populations of using diagnostic PCR amplicons. We found the endosymbiont to be very common in all screened natural and laboratory populations, while a hitherto uncharacterized strain was found only in laboratory populations. By establishing lacewing lines with no, single or co-infections of and , we found a high vertical transmission rate for both endosymbionts (>89%). However, we were only able to estimate these numbers for co-infected lacewings. negatively affected the reproductive success in single and co-infected , while showed no effect. We hypothesize that the fitness costs accrued by infections might be more tolerable in the laboratory than in natural populations, as the latter are also prone to fluctuating environmental conditions and natural enemies. The economic and ecological importance of lacewings in biological pest control warrants a more profound understanding of its biology, which might be influenced by symbionts.
内共生体广泛分布于昆虫体内，并能强烈影响其宿主的生态。普通草蛉（）是一种脉翅目昆虫，广泛应用于生物防治害虫。然而，它们的内共生体以及它们与宿主的相互作用尚未得到很好的研究。因此，我们使用诊断性PCR扩增子对自然种群和实验室种群中的内共生体进行了筛选。我们发现内共生体在所有筛选的自然种群和实验室种群中都非常常见，而一种迄今未鉴定的菌株仅在实验室种群中发现。通过建立无、单感染或共感染和的草蛉品系，我们发现这两种内共生体的垂直传播率都很高（>89%）。然而，我们只能对共感染的草蛉估计这些数字。对单感染和共感染的草蛉的繁殖成功率有负面影响，而则没有影响。我们推测，感染所产生的适合度代价在实验室中可能比在自然种群中更容易忍受，因为自然种群也容易受到环境条件波动和天敌的影响。草蛉在生物防治害虫中的经济和生态重要性，需要我们更深入地了解其生物学特性，而这可能会受到共生体的影响。
