Mitochondrial genomes of genus Atta (Formicidae: Myrmicinae) reveal high gene organization and giant intergenic spacers

Abstract

The ants of the genus Atta are considered important pests to agriculture in the Americas, although Atta species are also important contributors to ecosystem functions in the various habitats in which they occur. The aim of this study was to assemble four complete mitochondrial genomes of the genus Atta, construct the phylogenomic tree, and analyze the gene content, order, and organization. The mitogenomes of A. colombica, A. opaciceps, A. texana, and A.

The complete mitochondrial genome of Aphaenogaster famelica (Smith, 1874) (Hymenoptera: Formicidae)

“…It is the third longest ant mitogenome, which is only shorter than two Atta species: Atta sexdens: 19,748 bp and Atta texana:19,709 bp and longer than Atta opaciceps: 19,257 bp (Barbosa et al 2019). While Atta mitogenomes are extended across intergenic regions (Barbosa et al 2019), A. famelica mitogenome is elongated by the two long noncoding regions, each between trnV-trnM and trnI-trnQ, indicating independent events of mitogenome expansion. Gene order of A. famelica shares common feature of Myrmicinae ants where trnV is located after 12S rRNA (Babbucci et al 2014).…”

“…It is the third longest ant mitogenome, which is only shorter than two Atta species: Atta sexdens : 19,748 bp and Atta texana :19,709 bp and longer than Atta opaciceps : 19,257 bp (Barbosa et al. 2019 ). While Atta mitogenomes are extended across intergenic regions (Barbosa et al.…”

“…While Atta mitogenomes are extended across intergenic regions (Barbosa et al. 2019 ), A. famelica mitogenome is elongated by the two long noncoding regions, each between trnV - trnM and trnI - trnQ , indicating independent events of mitogenome expansion. Gene order of A. famelica shares common feature of Myrmicinae ants where trnV is located after 12S rRNA (Babbucci et al.…”

Complete mitochondrial genome of the acrobat ant Crematogaster teranishii Santschi, 1930 (Formicidae; Hymenoptera)

“…The mitochondrial genome of C. teranishii (GenBank accession: MK940828) is 17,442 bp long, and its GC ratio is 20.3%, both well within the range of available myrmicine mitogenomes 15,213 bp in Cardiocondyla obscurior (KX951753; Liu et al 2019) to 19,748 bp in Atta sexdens (MF591717; Barbosa et al 2019) in length and 17.5% in A. texana (MF417380; Barbosa et al 2019) to 23.9% in Wasmannia auropunctata (NC_030541; Duan et al 2016) in GC ratio. It includes 13 protein-coding genes (PCGs), two ribosomal RNAs, 22 transfer RNAs, and an AT-rich non-coding control region and the order of the 37 genes is identical to those of most Myrmicinae species (Babbucci et al 2014;Vieira and Prosdocimi 2019).…”

Complete mitochondrial genome of the jet ant Lasius spathepus Wheeler, W.M., 1910 (Formicidae; Hymenoptera)

“…The new mitochondrial genome of L. spathepus (GenBank accession: MW074965) is 18,951 bp long, 17.5% in GC ratio, and contains 37 standard genes of insect mitochondrial genomes, which includes 13 protein-coding genes, 2 rRNA genes, and 22 tRNA genes (Cameron 2014). Its large genome size is outmatched only by five ant species, four leaf-cutter ant species from genus Atta and Acromyrmex (Atta sexdens; MF591717; 19,748 bp, Atta texana; MF417380; 19,709 bp, Acromyrmex echinator; MK861063; 19,550 bp, Atta opaciceps; KY950643; 19,257bp; Barbosa et al 2019) and a collared ant species from genus Aphaenogaster (Aphaenogaster famelica NC_049859: 19,464 bp; Park et al 2020a). The AT-rich control region of L. spathepus mitogenome presented a whopping length of 2,147 bp, longer than any other ants mitogenomes since the extra bases of other ant mitochondrial genomes were dispersed in multiple intergenic regions while those of L. spathepus mitogenome were concentrated in the control region.…”