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Bacteria Endosymbiont, Wolbachia, Promotes Parasitism of Parasitoid Wasp Asobara japonica.

ABSTRACT: Wolbachia is the most widespread endosymbiotic bacterium that manipulates reproduction of its arthropod hosts to enhance its own spread throughout host populations. Infection with Wolbachia causes complete parthenogenetic reproduction in many Hymenoptera, producing only female offspring. The mechanism of such reproductive manipulation by Wolbachia has been extensively studied. However, the effects of Wolbachia symbiosis on behavioral traits of the hosts are scarcely investigated. The parasitoid wasp Asobara japonica is an ideal insect to investigate this because symbiotic and aposymbiotic strains are available: Wolbachia-infected Tokyo (TK) and noninfected Iriomote (IR) strains originally collected on the main island and southwest islands of Japan, respectively. We compared the oviposition behaviors of the two strains and found that TK strain females parasitized Drosophila melanogaster larvae more actively than the IR strain, especially during the first two days after eclosion. Removing Wolbachia from the TK strain wasps by treatment with tetracycline or rifampicin decreased their parasitism activity to the level of the IR strain. Morphological and behavioral analyses of both strain wasps showed that Wolbachia endosymbionts do not affect development of the host female reproductive tract and eggs, but do enhance host-searching ability of female wasps. These results suggest the possibility that Wolbachia endosymbionts may promote their diffusion and persistence in the host A. japonica population not only at least partly by parthenogenesis but also by enhancement of oviposition frequency of the host females.

SUBMITTER: Furihata S

PROVIDER: S-EPMC4619603 | biostudies-literature | 2015

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature

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Bacteria Endosymbiont, Wolbachia, Promotes Parasitism of Parasitoid Wasp Asobara japonica.

Furihata Shunsuke S Hirata Makiko M Matsumoto Hitoshi H Hayakawa Yoichi Y

PloS one 20151022 10

Wolbachia is the most widespread endosymbiotic bacterium that manipulates reproduction of its arthropod hosts to enhance its own spread throughout host populations. Infection with Wolbachia causes complete parthenogenetic reproduction in many Hymenoptera, producing only female offspring. The mechanism of such reproductive manipulation by Wolbachia has been extensively studied. However, the effects of Wolbachia symbiosis on behavioral traits of the hosts are scarcely investigated. The parasitoid ...[more]

PMID: 26492411

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Project description:BackgroundHaplodiploidy, where females develop from diploid, fertilized eggs and males from haploid, unfertilized eggs, is abundant in some insect lineages. Some species in these lineages reproduce by thelytoky that is caused by infection with endosymbionts: infected females lay haploid eggs that undergo diploidization and develop into females, while males are very rare or absent. It is generally assumed that in thelytokous wasps, endosymbionts merely diploidize the unfertilized eggs, which would then trigger female development.ResultsWe found that females in the parasitoid wasp Asobara japonica infected with thelytoky-inducing Wolbachia produce 0.7-1.2% male offspring. Seven to 39% of these males are diploid, indicating that diploidization and female development can be uncoupled in A. japonica. Wolbachia titer in adults was correlated with their ploidy and sex: diploids carried much higher Wolbachia titers than haploids, and diploid females carried more Wolbachia than diploid males. Data from introgression lines indicated that the development of diploid individuals into males instead of females is not caused by malfunction-mutations in the host genome but that diploid males are most likely produced when the endosymbiont fails to activate the female sex determination pathway. Our data therefore support a two-step mechanism by which endosymbionts induce thelytoky in A. japonica: diploidization of the unfertilized egg is followed by feminization, whereby each step correlates with a threshold of endosymbiont titer during wasp development.ConclusionsOur new model of endosymbiont-induced thelytoky overthrows the view that certain sex determination mechanisms constrain the evolution of endosymbiont-induced thelytoky in hymenopteran insects. Endosymbionts can cause parthenogenesis through feminization, even in groups in which endosymbiont-diploidized eggs would develop into males following the hosts' sex determination mechanism. In addition, our model broadens our understanding of the mechanisms by which endosymbionts induce thelytoky to enhance their transmission to the next generation. Importantly, it also provides a novel window to study the yet-poorly known haplodiploid sex determination mechanisms in haplodiploid insects.

Dataset Information

Bacteria Endosymbiont, Wolbachia, Promotes Parasitism of Parasitoid Wasp Asobara japonica.

Publications

Bacteria Endosymbiont, Wolbachia, Promotes Parasitism of Parasitoid Wasp Asobara japonica.

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