The dynamic interplay of bacteriophage, bacteria and the mammalian host during phage therapy

Two male-killing Wolbachia from Drosophila birauraia that are closely related but distinct in genome structure

“…However, the Buchnera genome structure has been extraordinarily stable over the past 100 million years of diversification between aphid species, despite high levels of divergence in gene sequence [48,49]. Wolbachia strains have relatively stable genome structures, although they are more dynamic than Buchnera strains [18,50,51]. In this study, we could not identify plausible features that could have driven the genome diversity of the w Biau strains (cf.…”

“…To clarify whether the Wolbachia strains encoded the MK gene of the Partiti-like virus DbMKPV1 in D. biauraria [23], we assessed the homology of their genes using a BLAST search, which revealed that they did not contain any genes with high homology (electronic supplementary material, table S4). As suggested by Homona moth, which harbours three different male killers ( Wolbachia , Spiroplasma and a Partiti-like virus OGV) [18,52,53], MK Wolbachia and DbMKPV1 are likely to induce MK in D. biauraria via different mechanisms (causative genes) and have acquired these mechanisms independently through different evolutionary processes.…”

“…Wolbachia genes wmk [32], cifs (cifA and cifB) [32–34], and oscar [18,35] were used to identify homologues in the w Biau1 and w Biau2 genomes using local BLASTn and BLASTp searches (default parameters). Motifs in the wmk , cifA, cifB, and oscar gene homologues were surveyed using InterPro () and HHpred ().…”

“…Genomic changes that lead to phenotypic changes and adaptation to new hosts are critical for the evolution of Wolbachia [14–18]. For example, the MK Wolbachia strain, w Hm-t, is thought to have evolved from its closely related non-MK strain, w Hm-c, in the tea tortrix, Homona magnanima , by acquiring an MK-associated prophage region [18].…”

“…Genomic changes that lead to phenotypic changes and adaptation to new hosts are critical for the evolution of Wolbachia [14–18]. For example, the MK Wolbachia strain, w Hm-t, is thought to have evolved from its closely related non-MK strain, w Hm-c, in the tea tortrix, Homona magnanima , by acquiring an MK-associated prophage region [18]. By contrast, Ostrinia furnacalis and Ostrinia scapulalis harbour closely related MK Wolbachia strains that show an extremely high degree of genomic similarity to several inversions [19].…”