Metabarcoding of mycetangia from the Dendroctonus frontalis species complex (Curculionidae: Scolytinae) reveals diverse and functionally redundant fungal assemblages

Abstract

and Zúñiga G (2022) Metabarcoding of mycetangia from the Dendroctonus frontalis species complex (Curculionidae: Scolytinae) reveals diverse and functionally redundant fungal assemblages.

Comparative metabarcoding and biodiversity of gut-associated fungal assemblages of Dendroctonus species (Curculionidae: Scolytinae)

“…In addition, some yeast taxa (e.g., Kuraishia, Ogataea, and Nakazawaea) degrade terpenes and/or affect pheromone production (Hunt and Borden, 1990), and several in silico studies in yeasts (e.g., Candida and Cyberlindnera) demonstrate the presence of genes and transcripts related to terpene detoxification, such as cytochromes P450, and Transporters ABC, MATE, and MFS, and others (Hernández-Martínez et al, 2016;Soto-Robles et al, 2019). The low abundance recorded in the gut of the fungal symbionts, including Ceratocystiopsis, Entomocorticium, Ophiostoma/Sporothrix, and Grosmannia/Leptographium, is surprising and consistent with other culture-based and culture-independent studies (Rivera et al, 2009;Bozorov et al, 2019), confirming that these symbionts are primarily associated with mycetangia (Vazquez-Ortiz et al, 2022) or body surfaces (Gao et al, 2018;Chakraborty et al, 2020) from Dendroctonus bark beetles. It is generally regarded as canon that Dendroctonus beetles feed on their respective associated mycetangial fungal taxa during development (Six and Klepzig, 2004;Six and Wingfield, 2011); however, it is puzzling why these taxa (Entomocorticium, Ophiostoma, Grosmannia) were not abundant in the gut if this is the primary nature of the association.…”

“…On the contrary, negative interactions are surely related to the regulation and stabilization of a minimal community rather than to the phenomena of competition or repulsion among them, because the gut is a highly selective habitat, metabolically dynamic, and spatially limiting by its compartmentalization and microenvironmental condition changing and dynamics during the development of these insects. The presence of a common mycobiome integrated only by the genus Candida and the replacement of ASVs suggest the integration of a functional, not taxonomic (Risely, 2020) whose members are acquired from the environment, as has been suggested in other studies (Hernández-García et al, 2018;Vazquez-Ortiz et al, 2022). However, regardless of the ecological interaction of fungal members within Dendroctonus spp.…”

“…Despite the strong association of Dendroctonus spp. with microbial communities, there is no evidence that they are acquired by vertical transmission, suggesting that they are acquired de novo in each new generation from the subcortical environment (Six and Bracewell, 2015;Hernández-García et al, 2017;Gonzalez-Escobedo et al, 2018;Vazquez-Ortiz et al, 2022).…”

“…Thus far, little is known about the gut mycobiome of Dendroctonus bark beetles (Rivera et al, 2009). Some studies have used cultureindependent techniques to describe the fungal community composition and changes across the life cycle of whole insects (Lou et al, 2014;Dohet et al, 2016;Durand et al, 2019), with only one earlier study analyzing the composition of fungal assemblages in the mycetangia of Dendroctonus frontalis species complex (Vazquez-Ortiz et al, 2022). In this study, we aim to characterize and compare the gut-associated fungal community of 14 species of the genus Dendroctonus through the analysis of the internal transcribed spacer 2 (ITS2) region.…”

Phylosymbiosis: The Eco-Evolutionary Pattern of Insect–Symbiont Interactions

“…Nevertheless, phylosymbiosis analyses of bacterial communities in coleopterans have yet to be conducted. Regarding symbiotic fungi, phylosymbiotic mycetangial communities were reported in the Dendroctonus frontalis species complex (Curculionidae: Scolytinae), but the mechanisms establishing fungal phylosymbiosis were unclear [34].…”