Narrow Genetic Diversity of <i>Wolbachia</i> Symbionts in Acrididae Grasshopper Hosts (Insecta, Orthoptera)
Bacteria of the <i>Wolbachia</i> genus are maternally inherited symbionts of Nematoda and numerous Arthropoda hosts. There are approximately 20 lineages of <i>Wolbachia</i>, which are called supergroups, and they are designated alphabetically. <i>Wolbachia</i> str...
| Main Authors: | , , , |
|---|---|
| Format: | Article |
| Language: | English |
| Published: |
MDPI AG
2022-01-01
|
| Series: | International Journal of Molecular Sciences |
| Subjects: | |
| Online Access: | https://www.mdpi.com/1422-0067/23/2/853 |
| Summary: | Bacteria of the <i>Wolbachia</i> genus are maternally inherited symbionts of Nematoda and numerous Arthropoda hosts. There are approximately 20 lineages of <i>Wolbachia</i>, which are called supergroups, and they are designated alphabetically. <i>Wolbachia</i> strains of the supergroups A and B are predominant in arthropods, especially in insects, and supergroup F seems to rank third. Host taxa have been studied very unevenly for <i>Wolbachia</i> symbionts, and here, we turn to one of largely unexplored insect families: Acrididae. On the basis of five genes subject to multilocus sequence typing, we investigated the incidence and genetic diversity of <i>Wolbachia</i> in 41 species belonging three subfamilies (Gomphocerinae, Oedipodinae, and Podisminae) collected in Turkey, Kazakhstan, Tajikistan, Russia, and Japan, making 501 specimens in total. Our results revealed a high incidence and very narrow genetic diversity of <i>Wolbachia</i>. Although only the strains belonging to supergroups A and B are commonly present in present, the Acrididae hosts here proved to be infected with supergroups B and F without A-supergroup variants. The only trace of an A-supergroup lineage was noted in one case of an inter-supergroup recombinant haplotype, where the <i>ftsZ</i> gene came from supergroup A, and the others from supergroup B. Variation in the <i>Wolbachia</i> haplotypes in Acrididae hosts within supergroups B and F was extremely low. A comprehensive genetic analysis of <i>Wolbachia</i> diversity confirmed specific features of the <i>Wolbachia</i> allelic set in Acrididae hosts. This result can help to elucidate the crucial issue of <i>Wolbachia</i> biology: the route(s) and mechanism(s) of <i>Wolbachia</i> horizontal transmission. |
|---|---|
| ISSN: | 1661-6596 1422-0067 |