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Postembryonic RNAi in Heterorhabditis bacteriophora: a nematode insect parasite and host for insect pathogenic symbionts.

ABSTRACT: BACKGROUND: Heterorhabditis bacteriophora is applied throughout the world for the biological control of insects and is an animal model to study interspecies interactions, e.g. mutualism, parasitism and vector-borne disease. H. bacteriophora nematodes are mutually associated with the insect pathogen, Photorhabdus luminescens. The developmentally arrested infective juvenile (IJ) stage nematode (vector) specifically transmits Photorhabdus luminescens bacteria (pathogen) in its gut mucosa to the haemocoel of insects (host). The nematode vector and pathogen alone are not known to cause insect disease. RNA interference is an excellent reverse genetic tool to study gene function in C. elegans, and it would be useful in H. bacteriophora to exploit the H. bacteriophora genome project, currently in progress. RESULTS: Soaking L1 stage H. bacteriophora with seven dsRNAs of genes whose C. elegans orthologs had severe RNAi phenotypes resulted in highly penetrant and obvious developmental and reproductive abnormalities. The efficacy of postembryonic double strand RNA interference (RNAi) was evident by abnormal gonad morphology and sterility of adult H. bacteriophora and C. elegans presumable due to defects in germ cell proliferation and gonad development. The penetrance of RNAi phenotypes in H. bacteriophora was high for five genes (87-100%; Hba-cct-2, Hba-daf-21, Hba-icd-1; Hba-nol-5, and Hba-W01G7.3) and moderate for two genes (usually 30-50%; Hba-rack-1 and Hba-arf-1). RNAi of three additional C. elegans orthologs for which RNAi phenotypes were not previously detected in C. elegans, also did not result in any apparent phenotypes in H. bacteriophora. Specific and severe reduction in transcript levels in RNAi treated L1s was determined by quantitative real-time RT-PCR. These results suggest that postembryonic RNAi by soaking is potent and specific. CONCLUSION: Although RNAi is conserved in animals and plants, RNAi using long dsRNA is not. These results demonstrate that RNAi can be used effectively in H. bacteriophora and can be applied for analyses of nematode genes involved in symbiosis and parasitism. It is likely that RNAi will be an important tool for functional genomics utilizing the high quality draft H. bacteriophora genome sequence.

SUBMITTER: Ciche TA

PROVIDER: S-EPMC2014770 | biostudies-literature | 2007

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature

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Postembryonic RNAi in Heterorhabditis bacteriophora: a nematode insect parasite and host for insect pathogenic symbionts.

Ciche Todd A TA Sternberg Paul W PW

BMC developmental biology 20070905

<h4>Background</h4>Heterorhabditis bacteriophora is applied throughout the world for the biological control of insects and is an animal model to study interspecies interactions, e.g. mutualism, parasitism and vector-borne disease. H. bacteriophora nematodes are mutually associated with the insect pathogen, Photorhabdus luminescens. The developmentally arrested infective juvenile (IJ) stage nematode (vector) specifically transmits Photorhabdus luminescens bacteria (pathogen) in its gut mucosa to ...[more]

PMID: 17803822

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Project description:The success of a biological control agent depends on key traits, particularly reproductive potential, environmental tolerance, and ability to be cultured. These traits can deteriorate rapidly when the biological control agent is reared in culture. Trait deterioration under laboratory conditions has been widely documented in the entomopathogenic nematode (EPN) Heterorhabditis bacteriophora (Hb) but the specific mechanisms behind these genetic processes remain unclear. This research investigates the molecular mechanisms of trait deterioration of two experimental lines of Hb, an inbred line (L5M) and its original parental line (OHB). We generated transcriptional profiles of two experimental lines of Hb, identified the differentially expressed genes (DEGs) and validated their differential expression in the deteriorated line.An expression profiling study was performed between experimental lines L5M and OHB of Hb with probes for 15,220 ESTs from the Hb transcriptome. Microarray analysis showed 1,185 DEGs comprising of 469 down- and 716 up-regulated genes in trait deteriorated nematodes. Analysis of the DEGs showed that trait deterioration involves massive changes of the transcripts encoding enzymes involved in metabolism, signal transduction, virulence and longevity. We observed a pattern of reduced expression of enzymes related to primary metabolic processes and induced secondary metabolism. Expression of sixteen DEGs in trait deteriorated nematodes was validated by quantitative reverse transcription-PCR (qRT-PCR) which revealed similar expression kinetics for all the genes tested as shown by microarray.As the most closely related major entomopathogen to C. elegans, Hb provides an attractive near-term application for using a model organism to better understand interspecies interactions and to enhance our understanding of the mechanisms underlying trait deterioration in biological control agents. This information could also be used to improve the beneficial traits of biological control agents and better understand fundamental aspects of nematode parasitism and mutualism.

Project description:The entomopathogenic nematode Heterorhabditis bacteriophora and its symbiotic bacterium, Photorhabdus luminescens, are important biological control agents of insect pests. This nematode-bacterium-insect association represents an emerging tripartite model for research on mutualistic and parasitic symbioses. Elucidation of mechanisms underlying these biological processes may serve as a foundation for improving the biological control potential of the nematode-bacterium complex. This large-scale expressed sequence tag (EST) analysis effort enables gene discovery and development of microsatellite markers. These ESTs will also aid in the annotation of the upcoming complete genome sequence of H. bacteriophora.A total of 31,485 high quality ESTs were generated from cDNA libraries of the adult H. bacteriophora TTO1 strain. Cluster analysis revealed the presence of 3,051 contigs and 7,835 singletons, representing 10,886 distinct EST sequences. About 72% of the distinct EST sequences had significant matches (E value < 1e-5) to proteins in GenBank's non-redundant (nr) and Wormpep190 databases. We have identified 12 ESTs corresponding to 8 genes potentially involved in RNA interference, 22 ESTs corresponding to 14 genes potentially involved in dauer-related processes, and 51 ESTs corresponding to 27 genes potentially involved in defense and stress responses. Comparison to ESTs and proteins of free-living nematodes led to the identification of 554 parasitic nematode-specific ESTs in H. bacteriophora, among which are those encoding F-box-like/WD-repeat protein theromacin, Bax inhibitor-1-like protein, and PAZ domain containing protein. Gene Ontology terms were assigned to 6,685 of the 10,886 ESTs. A total of 168 microsatellite loci were identified with primers designable for 141 loci.A total of 10,886 distinct EST sequences were identified from adult H. bacteriophora cDNA libraries. BLAST searches revealed ESTs potentially involved in parasitism, RNA interference, defense responses, stress responses, and dauer-related processes. The putative microsatellite markers identified in H. bacteriophora ESTs will enable genetic mapping and population genetic studies. These genomic resources provide the material base necessary for genome annotation, microarray development, and in-depth gene functional analysis.

Project description:BackgroundDespite important progress in the field of innate immunity, our understanding of host immune responses to parasitic nematode infections lags behind that of responses to microbes. A limiting factor has been the obligate requirement for a vertebrate host which has hindered investigation of the parasitic nematode infective process. The nematode parasite Heterorhabditis bacteriophora offers great potential as a model to genetically dissect the process of infection. With its mutualistic Photorhabdus luminescens bacteria, H. bacteriophora invades multiple species of insects, which it kills and exploits as a food source for the development of several nematode generations. The ability to culture the life cycle of H. bacteriophora on plates growing the bacterial symbiont makes it a very exciting model of parasitic infection that can be used to unlock the molecular events occurring during infection of a host that are inaccessible using vertebrate hosts.ResultsTo profile the transcriptional response of an infective nematode during the early stage of infection, we performed next generation RNA sequencing on H. bacteriophora IJs incubated in Manduca sexta hemolymph plasma for 9 h. A subset of up-regulated and down-regulated genes were validated using qRT-PCR. Comparative analysis of the transcriptome with untreated controls found a number of differentially expressed genes (DEGs) which cover a number of different functional categories. A subset of DEGs is conserved across Clade V parasitic nematodes revealing an array of candidate parasitic genes.ConclusionsOur analysis reveals transcriptional changes in the regulation of a large number of genes, most of which have not been shown previously to play a role in the process of infection. A significant proportion of these genes are unique to parasitic nematodes, suggesting the identification of a group of parasitism factors within nematodes. Future studies using these candidates may provide functional insight into the process of nematode parasitism and also the molecular evolution of parasitism within nematodes.

Dataset Information

Postembryonic RNAi in Heterorhabditis bacteriophora: a nematode insect parasite and host for insect pathogenic symbionts.

Publications

Postembryonic RNAi in Heterorhabditis bacteriophora: a nematode insect parasite and host for insect pathogenic symbionts.

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