Complete mitochondrial genome of the dwarf honeybee,Apis florea(Hymenoptera: Apidae)

Abstract

In this study, the 17,694-bp long complete mitochondrial genome (mitogenome) of the dwarf honeybee, Apis florea (Hymenoptera: Apidae), was described, and a noteworthy triplicated tRNA(ser)(AGN) region and an extraordinary long A+T-rich region with repeat regions were identified. The gene arrangement of A. florea mitogenome was identical to that of Apis mellifera, but it contained three tRNA(Ser)(AGN), each of which was preceded by a 44-bp-long repeat unit and followed by a 64-bp-long repeat unit plus one complete first repeat adjacent to tRNA(Met). A total of 1610-bp long two repeat regions in 1987-bp long A+T-rich region were composed of nearly identical 141-219-bp long 5 tandem repeats and 50-52-bp long 12 tandem repeats that were encompassed by three non-repeat sequences. One potential explanation for this repeat sequence is slipped-strand mispairing and unequal crossing-over events during DNA replication.

Is It an Ant or a Butterfly? Convergent Evolution in the Mitochondrial Gene Order of Hymenoptera and Lepidoptera

“…Some mtDNAs have more than 37 genes. This increased number is due to the occurrence of multiple contiguous copies of one or more tRNAs (e.g., Apis florea , Wang et al 2013; fig. 4).…”

Structure and genetic variation of the mitochondrial control region in the honey bee Apis mellifera

“…On the other hand, the high mutation rate that characterizes the variable blocks is certainly the cause for the high number of parallel or recurrent mutations in different lineages producing poorly resolved phylogenetic networks or unsupported topologies. In relation to the genus Apis , only three complete mitochondrion genomes containing the control region (A. mellifera , Apis cerana , and Apis florea ) exist in databases (Crozier and Crozier 1993;Tan et al 2011;Wang et al 2013), but further characterization of the sequence variation of the A+T rich region has not been performed.…”

Mitochondrial DNA variations in Korean Apis cerana (Hymenoptera: Apidae) and development of another potential marker

“…Sequence alignment of the three Apis mt genomes (GenBank accession numbers NC_001566 for A. mellifera , GQ162109 for A. cerana , and JX982136 for A. florea ) (Crozier and Crozier 1993;Tan et al 2011;Wang et al 2013) shows that A. cerana has three additional unique non-coding regions located between tRNA Met and tRNA Gln (231 bp), between COIII and tRNA Gly (66 bp), and between tRNA Pro and ND6 (50 bp), respectively (called NC1, NC3, and NC4, respectively, considering their positions in the A. cerana mt genome). Primers were designed at tRNA Ser and tRNA lle of the A. cerana mt genome sequence for NC1, COIII, and ND3 for NC3, and at ND4L and ND6 for NC4 (Figure 2).…”

“…Although NC2 is informative for the illustration of worldwide genetic diversity and biogeography of A. cerana , additional markers will be useful to expand our understanding of these aspects. The full-length A. cerana mt genome from China has been reported (Tan et al 2011), and a genomic comparison of Apis species shows three additional spacer sequences that are longer than NC2 and unique to the A. cerana mt genome (Crozier and Crozier 1993;Tan et al 2011;Wang et al 2013). We assessed the potential of these three spacer sequences and found the internal spacer region located between tRNA Met and tRNA Gln (termed NC1) the most useful one.…”