Nematodes of the genus Pristionchus are closely associated with scarab beetles and the Colorado potato beetle in Western Europe

Herrmann, M.; Mayer, Werner E.; Sommer, Ralf J.

doi:10.1016/j.zool.2006.03.001

Cited by 140 publications

(201 citation statements)

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“…Pristionchus pacificus is a necromenic nematode, i.e. uses its dead host as a source of food, and shows a life history tightly associated with beetles [19,20]. Previous comparisons of nictation in different nematode species suggested a relationship to host attachment, but the present study is the first to show a relationship of the evolutionary history of foraging behaviour in nematodes at the population level by the use of different P. pacificus strains.…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 52%

Host-finding behaviour in the nematodePristionchus pacificus

2011

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Costs and benefits of foraging have been studied in predatory animals. In nematodes, ambushing or cruising behaviours represent adaptations that optimize foraging strategies for survival and host finding. A behaviour associated with host finding of ambushing nematode dauer juveniles is a sit-and-wait behaviour, otherwise known as nictation. Here, we test the function of nictation by relating occurrence of nictation in Pristionchus pacificus dauer juveniles to the ability to attach to laboratory host Galleria mellonella. We used populations of recently isolated and mutagenized laboratory strains. We found that nictation can be disrupted using a classical forward genetic approach and characterized two novel nictation-defective mutant strains. We identified two recently isolated strains from la Réunion island, one with a higher proportion of nictating individuals than the laboratory strain P. pacificus PS312. We found a positive correlation between nictation frequencies and host attachment in these strains. Taken together, our combination of genetic analyses with natural variation studies presents a new approach to the investigation of behavioural and ecological functionality. We show that nictation behaviour in P. pacificus nematodes serves as a host-finding behaviour. Our results suggest that nictation plays a role in the evolution of new life-history strategies, such as the evolution of parasitism.

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Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 52%

Host-finding behaviour in the nematodePristionchus pacificus

2011

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“…Worms are grown on Escherichia coli OP50 as described previously. Collection procedures and origins of Pristionchus isolates are described elsewhere (13,14,16). Because of long inbreeding in the laboratory and the hermaphroditic mode of reproduction, the wild-type strains used in this study are likely to be homozygous at nearly all loci.…”

Section: Methodsmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…The 2°-1°-2°pattern of the vulva and most other aspects of morphology are strongly conserved within the genus Pristionchus. Indeed, the 18 species of the genus can be classified according to reproductive mode (hermaphrodites or gonochorists), but a reliable species identification based on morphology alone is close to impossible (13,14). This stability of vulva morphology and cell lineage over evolutionary time, a general phenomenon in many nematode genera, can be attributed to robustness of developmental modules to mutation (1).…”

Section: Invariability Of the Vulva Phenotype Despite Natural Variatimentioning

confidence: 99%

Evolution of robustness in the signaling network of Pristionchus vulva development

Zauner

Sommer

2007

Proc. Natl. Acad. Sci. U.S.A.

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Robustness to environmental or genetic perturbation, like any other trait, is affected by evolutionary change. However, direct studies on the interplay of robustness and evolvability are limited and require experimental microevolutionary studies of developmental processes. One system in which such microevolutionary studies can be performed is vulva development in the nematode Pristionchus pacificus. Three vulval precursor cells respond to redundant cell-cell interactions, including signals from the gonad and the epidermal cell P8.p. Interestingly, P. pacificus P8.p is involved in cell fate specification of the future vulva cells by lateral inhibition but is incompetent to respond to the inductive signal from the gonad itself. These functional properties of P8.p are unknown from other nematodes, such as Caenorhabditis elegans. We began an experimental and genetic analysis of the microevolution of P8.p function. We show that vulva misspecification events differ between Pristionchus strains and species. Similarly, lateral inhibition and developmental competence of P8.p evolved within the genus Pristionchus and between natural isolates of P. pacificus. Surprisingly, in some recombinant inbred lines of two distinct P. pacificus isolates, P8.p gained competence to form vulva tissue, a trait that was never observed in P. pacificus isolates. Our results suggest differences in developmental stability between natural isolates, and we hypothesize that the remarkable evolvability of redundant cell-cell interactions allows for adaptive evolution of robustness to developmental noise. evolvability ͉ developmental stability

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“…Moving a bit away from species of Caenorhabditis, we examined the population structure within Pristionchus pacificus, also a free-living nematode with close associations to scarab beetles and the Colorado potato beetle (Herrmann et al, 2006). Whole-genome sequencing performed on 104 isolates showed a level of genetic diversity that was 10 times greater than that observed in C. elegans, along with a more discernable population structure (R¨odelsperger et al, 2014).…”

Section: Free-living Nematodesmentioning

confidence: 99%