Host-symbiont specificity determined by microbe-microbe competition in an insect gut.

ABSTRACT: Despite the omnipresence of specific host-symbiont associations with acquisition of the microbial symbiont from the environment, little is known about how the specificity of the interaction evolved and is maintained. The bean bug Riptortus pedestris acquires a specific bacterial symbiont of the genus Burkholderia from environmental soil and harbors it in midgut crypts. The genus Burkholderia consists of over 100 species, showing ecologically diverse lifestyles, and including serious human pathogens, plant pathogens, and nodule-forming plant mutualists, as well as insect mutualists. Through infection tests of 34 Burkholderia species and 18 taxonomically diverse bacterial species, we demonstrate here that nonsymbiotic Burkholderia and even its outgroup P

SUBMITTER: Itoh H 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC6842582 | biostudies-literature | 2019 Nov

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature