Sexual-biased gene expression of olfactory-related genes in the antennae of Conogethes pinicolalis (Lepidoptera: Crambidae)

Abstract

Background Conogethes pinicolalis (Lepidoptera: Crambidae), is similar to Conogethes punctiferalis (yellow peach moth) and its host plant is gymnosperms, especially for masson pine. So far, less literature was reported on this pest. In present study, we sequenced and characterized the antennal transcriptomes of male and female C. pinicolalis for the first time. Results Totally, 26 odorant-binding proteins (OBP) genes, 19 chemosensory proteins (CSP) genes, 55 odorant receptors (OR) genes and 20 ionotropic receptors (IR) genes were identified from the C. pinicolalis antennae transcriptome and most of them were olfactory genes, amino sequences were annotated against homologs of C. punctiferalis. The neighbor-joining tree indicated that the amino acid sequence of olfactory related genes is highly homologous with C. punctiferalis. Furthermore, the reference genes were selected, and we strongly recommended the GAPDH or RP49 to verify gene expression for larvae development and RP49 or RPL13 for adult tissues. Conclusions Our study provides a starting point on the molecular level characterization between C. pinicolalis and C. punctiferalis, which might be a supportive for pest management studies in future.