Yu Jing, Wang Hongfang, Chen Wenfeng, Song Hongyu, Wang Ying, Liu Zhenguo, Xu Baohua
College of Animal Science and Technology, Shandong Agricultural University, Tai'an 271000, China.
Metabolites. 2023 Jan 3;13(1):80. doi: 10.3390/metabo13010080.
The hormone 20-hydroxyecdysone (20E) and the ecdysone receptors (ECR and USP) play critical roles in the growth and metabolism of insects, including honeybees. In this study, we investigated the effect of 20E on the growth and development of honeybee larvae by rearing them in vitro and found reduced food consumption and small-sized pupae with increasing levels of 20E. A liquid chromatography-tandem mass spectrometry (LC-MS/MS)-based analysis of widely targeted metabolomics was used to examine the changes in the metabolites after an exogenous 20E application to honeybee larvae and the underlying mechanisms. A total of 374 different metabolites were detected between the control group and the 20E treatment group, covering 12 subclasses. The most significant changes occurred in 7-day-old larvae, where some monosaccharides, such as D-Glucose and UDP-galactose, were significantly upregulated. In addition, some metabolic pathways, such as glycolysis/gluconeogenesis and galactose metabolism, were affected by the 20E treatment, suggesting that the 20E treatment disrupts the metabolic homeostasis of honeybee larvae hemolymph and that the response of honeybee larvae to the 20E treatment is dynamic and contains many complex pathways. Many genes involved in carbohydrate metabolism, including genes of the glycolysis and glycogen synthesis pathways, were downregulated during molting and pupation after the 20E treatment. In contrast, the expression levels of the genes related to gluconeogenesis and glycogenolysis were significantly increased, which directly or indirectly upregulated glucose levels in the hemolymph, whereas RNA interference with the 20E receptor EcR-USP had an opposite effect to that of the 20E treatment. Taken together, 20E plays a critical role in the changes in carbohydrate metabolism during metamorphosis.
激素20-羟基蜕皮酮（20E）和蜕皮酮受体（ECR和USP）在包括蜜蜂在内的昆虫生长和代谢中起关键作用。在本研究中，我们通过体外饲养来研究20E对蜜蜂幼虫生长发育的影响，发现随着20E水平的升高，食物消耗量减少且蛹的体型变小。基于液相色谱-串联质谱（LC-MS/MS）的广泛靶向代谢组学分析被用于检测外源20E应用于蜜蜂幼虫后代谢物的变化及其潜在机制。对照组和20E处理组之间共检测到374种不同代谢物，涵盖12个亚类。最显著的变化发生在7日龄幼虫中，一些单糖，如D-葡萄糖和UDP-半乳糖显著上调。此外，一些代谢途径，如糖酵解/糖异生和半乳糖代谢，受到20E处理的影响，这表明20E处理破坏了蜜蜂幼虫血淋巴的代谢稳态，并且蜜蜂幼虫对20E处理的反应是动态的，包含许多复杂途径。20E处理后，许多参与碳水化合物代谢的基因，包括糖酵解和糖原合成途径的基因，在蜕皮和化蛹期间下调。相反，与糖异生和糖原分解相关的基因表达水平显著增加，这直接或间接上调了血淋巴中的葡萄糖水平，而对20E受体EcR-USP进行RNA干扰产生了与20E处理相反的效果。综上所述，20E在变态过程中碳水化合物代谢变化中起关键作用。
