Yanagisawa Takahiro, Kato Yuto, Inoue Maki N
Department of Agriculture, Tokyo University of Agriculture and Technology, 3-5-8 Saiwai-cho, Fuchu, Tokyo 183-8509, Japan.
Insects. 2023 Mar 30;14(4):340. doi: 10.3390/insects14040340.
Microsporidia are spore-forming intracellular parasites of various invertebrates and vertebrates. negatively affects the fitness of bumblebees and its prevalence correlates with declining bumblebee populations. The invasive alien species colonized Japan and possibly introduced new parasites. To assess the infection prevalence of in Japanese bumblebees and , we investigated infections using PCR and microscopy. The prevalence of sporulating infections in three s. str. species/subspecies was low, whereas that of non/low-sporulating sp. infections in three species/subspecies was high. Invasive showed low prevalence of non/low-sporulating infections and shared the same haplotype with found in Hokkaido, where is present, and in Honshu, where is absent. Although may have been introduced with colonies imported from Europe, it seems to be originally distributed in Japan. Furthermore, a new sp. was found in Japanese bumblebee species. and sp. showed different organ and host specificities in bumblebees. There are no reports on the specific effects of other spp. on bumblebees; further studies are needed to clarify the individual characteristics of spp.
微孢子虫是各种无脊椎动物和脊椎动物的形成孢子的细胞内寄生虫。对熊蜂的健康有负面影响，其流行率与熊蜂种群数量下降相关。外来入侵物种在日本定殖，并可能引入了新的寄生虫。为了评估日本熊蜂和中微孢子虫的感染率，我们使用聚合酶链反应（PCR）和显微镜检查来调查感染情况。三种中华蜜蜂（Apis cerana cerana）物种/亚种中形成孢子的微孢子虫感染率较低，而三种熊蜂物种/亚种中非/低形成孢子的微孢子虫感染率较高。入侵的西方蜜蜂（Apis mellifera）显示出非/低形成孢子的微孢子虫感染率较低，并且与在北海道（西方蜜蜂存在）和本州（西方蜜蜂不存在）发现的西方蜜蜂共享相同的单倍型。尽管西方蜜蜂可能是随从欧洲进口的蜂群引入的，但它似乎原本就分布在日本。此外，在日本熊蜂物种中发现了一种新的微孢子虫物种。微孢子虫和新微孢子虫物种在熊蜂中表现出不同的器官和宿主特异性。关于其他微孢子虫物种对熊蜂的具体影响尚无报道；需要进一步研究以阐明微孢子虫物种的个体特征。
