Nasonia vitripennis

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Nasonia vitripennis
Nasoniavit.jpg
Nasonia vitripennis female
Scientific classification OOjs UI icon edit-ltr.svg
Kingdom: Animalia
Phylum: Arthropoda
Class: Insecta
Order: Hymenoptera
Family: Pteromalidae
Genus: Nasonia
Species:
N. vitripennis
Binomial name
Nasonia vitripennis
(Walker, 1836)

Nasonia vitripennis (or Mormoniella vitripennis, or Nasonia brevicornis) is one of four known species under the genus Nasonia - small parasitoid wasps that afflict the larvae of parasitic carrion flies such as blowflies and flesh flies, which themselves are parasitic toward nestling birds. It is the best known and most widely studied of the parasitoid wasps, and their study forms a vital part of the information used to describe the order Hymenoptera, along with information from bees and ants. This parasitoid behaviour makes the wasps an interest for the development of biopesticide and biological systems for controlling unwanted insects. [1] [2]

Contents

The biosynthetic pathways for sex pheromones in Hymenoptera, determination of sex in development, and many protein and gene product comparisons to other insects have been studied using N. vitripennis (most often contrasted against the Western honey bee, Apis mellifera). [3]

Nasonia vitripennis also has a high variety of proteins that have been discovered for venom and detection of odours and has repetitive DNA; [4] this information has been made easier for study since the complete sequencing and release of the genome of N. vitripennis in 2010. [5]

Physiology

As in other Nasonia wasps, N. vitripennis is haplodiploid, having haploid males and diploid females, and measures from 2–3 mm in length, with larger and darker-colored females than males. These wasps, like most other insects, show much sexual dimorphism, and females tend to be less easy to distinguish by species than males. N. vitripennis females have a straight stigmal vein (a short branch from the stigma of the forewing), in comparison to the varying curvature in its three sister species. Males are generally distinguished using antenna and wing shape. Male N. vitripennis wasps have a spindle-shaped scape (the lower half of the antenna), meaning it is wider in the middle than at either of the joint ends. (This is in comparison to the “angulate” shape seen in N. giraulti and N. oneida, or the cylindrical shape of N. longicornis). The antennal flagellum is also shorter and wider than in the other three species of Nasonia. Male N. vitripennis have small forewings, in comparison to other Nasonia relatives. [6]

Pheromones and sexual behaviour

Male N. vitripennis wasps produce pheromones from papillae inside a rectal vesicle, and release pheromones through the anus. Female wasps show no similar organ for pheromone release. Prior research has pointed to the rectal papillae (inside the rectal vesicle) for the purpose of water and electrolyte resorption, since the adult male wasps rarely feed; however, localization techniques, pheromone biosynthesis data and observations of wasp behaviour (tapping abdomen on the ground, leaving traces of pheromone) all point to these organs being used in sexual communication. [3]

Cephalic pheromones are also present in N. vitripennis, coming from the mouth of the males during courtship, which females contact with their antennae while signaling their receptivity to mating. The distinctive chemical mixture in male pheromones strongly attracts virgin females; mated females (and females merely exposed to the male pheromones) experimentally have shown little to no attraction.

After mating, females then turn their attention to searching for a host larva in which to oviposit – a behaviour which reroutes wasted time that would be spent over-mating to searching for a suitable host. This behavioural ‘switch’ is thought to be caused by pheromones alone, rather than by sperm transfer, as seems to be the case in other insects. [7] Egg-laying in N. vitripennis occurs in the same fashion in all known species of Nasonia, where a mated female drills into and deposits her eggs under the puparum of fly larvae.

Non-CSD sex determination

Hymenoptera largely reproduce through facultative parthenogenesis, where haploid males develop from unfertilized eggs (arrhenotoky) and diploid females develop from fertilized eggs. [8]

Sex determination in all Nasonia has been shown to be due mainly to fertilization status (fertilized or unfertilized as an egg), as well as by chromosome number. Nasonia and other Chalcid wasps use a different sex determination system than a large portion of Hymenopterans (including Honey bees), who use CSD (complementary sex determination), where sex is determined by homozygous or heterozygous alleles of a single gene. The most recent accepted model for this non-CSD system is called Maternal Effect Genomic Imprinting Sex Determination (MEGISD). This model involves a masculinizing/virilizing maternal effect gene that “imprints upon” the cytoplasmic component of oocytes, and an “unimprinted” paternal contribution (in female offspring) that provides a counter effect to virilization and allows for female development to occur. Since all diploid eggs become female (due to the factor originating in the male genetic contribution that prevents masculinization), this differs from CSD in that under CSD, males can be diploid if they are homozygous or hemizygous. [9]

Wolbachia

Wolbachia are maternally inherited, and exist in multiple insect species. Multiple strains of Wolbachia have been noted in even single strains of Nasonia. These bacteria are a very well-documented endosymbiont (arguably parasite) of the wasps that can have consequences for fertility when their presence is altered. [6] [10] It has been suggested that Wolbachia have assisted with genetic divergence through buildup of mutations and selecting for compensatory mechanisms, causing the emergence of new strains to occur more quickly. This is through a model of ‘mitochondrial sweeping’, when Wolbachia bring mitochondria from one host population to another. [10] [11]

Related Research Articles

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Hymenoptera</span> Order of insects comprising sawflies, wasps, bees, and ants

Hymenoptera is a large order of insects, comprising the sawflies, wasps, bees, and ants. Over 150,000 living species of Hymenoptera have been described, in addition to over 2,000 extinct ones. Many of the species are parasitic. Females typically have a special ovipositor for inserting eggs into hosts or places that are otherwise inaccessible. This ovipositor is often modified into a stinger. The young develop through holometabolism —that is, they have a wormlike larval stage and an inactive pupal stage before they mature.

<i>Wolbachia</i> Genus of bacteria in the Alphaproteobacteria class

Wolbachia is a genus of intracellular bacteria that infects mainly arthropod species, including a high proportion of insects, and also some nematodes. It is one of the most common parasitic microbes, and is possibly the most common reproductive parasite in the biosphere. Its interactions with its hosts are often complex, and in some cases have evolved to be mutualistic rather than parasitic. Some host species cannot reproduce, or even survive, without Wolbachia colonisation. One study concluded that more than 16% of neotropical insect species carry bacteria of this genus, and as many as 25 to 70% of all insect species are estimated to be potential hosts.

<i>Trichogramma</i> Genus of parasitic insects

Trichogramma is a genus of minute polyphagous wasps that are endoparasitoids of insect eggs. Trichogramma is one of around 80 genera from the family Trichogrammatidae, with over 200 species worldwide.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Haplodiploidy</span> Biological system where sex is determined by the number of sets of chromosomes

Haplodiploidy is a sex-determination system in which males develop from unfertilized eggs and are haploid, and females develop from fertilized eggs and are diploid. Haplodiploidy is sometimes called arrhenotoky.

The mechanisms of reproductive isolation are a collection of evolutionary mechanisms, behaviors and physiological processes critical for speciation. They prevent members of different species from producing offspring, or ensure that any offspring are sterile. These barriers maintain the integrity of a species by reducing gene flow between related species.

<i>Bombus ternarius</i> Species of insect

Bombus ternarius, commonly known as the orange-belted bumblebee or tricolored bumblebee, is a yellow, orange and black bumblebee. It is a ground-nesting social insect whose colony cycle lasts only one season, common throughout the northeastern United States and much of Canada. The orange-belted bumblebee forages on Rubus, goldenrods, Vaccinium, and milkweeds found throughout the colony's range. Like many other members of the genus, Bombus ternarius exhibits complex social structure with a reproductive queen caste and a multitude of sister workers with labor such as foraging, nursing, and nest maintenance divided among the subordinates.

<i>Nasonia</i> Genus of wasps

Nasonia are a genus of small pteromalid parasitoid wasps that sting and lay eggs in the pupae of various flies. The fly species that Nasonia usually parasitize are primarily blow flies and flesh flies, making Nasonia a useful tool for biocontrol of these pest flies. The small match-head sized wasps are also referred to as jewel wasps based on the emerald sheen of their exoskeleton.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Wasp</span> Members of the order Hymenoptera which are neither ants nor bees

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Nasonia longicornis is a species of pteromalid wasp in the family Pteromalidae. It can be identified by the structure of its antennae. It is a parasitoid of Protocalliphora pupae, usually found in birds' nests. The species is found in western North America. Females usually only mate once in their lifetime.

Arsenophonus nasoniae is a species of bacterium which was previously isolated from Nasonia vitripennis, a species of parasitoid wasp. These wasps are generalists which afflict the larvae of parasitic carrion flies such as blowflies, houseflies and flesh flies. A. nasoniae belongs to the phylum Pseudomonadota and family Morganellaceae.The genus Arsenophonus, has a close relationship to the Proteus (bacterium) rather than to that of Salmonella and Escherichia. The genus is composed of gammaproteobacterial, secondary-endosymbionts which are gram-negative. Cells are non-flagellated, non-motile, non-spore forming and form long to highly filamentous rods. Cellular division is exhibited through septation. The name 'Arsenophonus nasoniae gen. nov., sp. nov.' was therefore proposed for the discovered bacterium due to its characteristics and its microbial interaction with N. vitripennis. The type strain of A. nasoniae is Strain SKI4.

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References

  1. ↑ Zhang, Zhong; Ye, Gong-yin; Cai, Jun; Hua, Cui (2005). "Comparative venom toxicity between Pteromalus puparum and Nasonia vitripennis (Hymenoptera: Pteromalidae) toward the hemocytes of their natural hosts, non-target insects and cultured insect cells". Toxicon. 46 (3): 337–349. doi:10.1016/j.toxicon.2005.05.005. PMID   16026808.
  2. ↑ Noyes, J.S. (2015). Universal Chalcidoidea Database. [World Wide Web electronic publication]. Retrieved from: http://www.nhm.ac.uk/our-science/data/chalcidoids/
  3. 1 2 Abdel-latief, Mohatmed; Garbe, Leif A.; Koch, Markus; Ruther, Joachim (2008). "An epoxide hydrolase involved in the biosynthesis of an insect sex attractant and its use to localize the production site". PNAS. 105 (26): 8914–8919. Bibcode:2008PNAS..105.8914A. doi: 10.1073/pnas.0801559105 . PMC   2449339 . PMID   18579785.
  4. ↑ Wurm, Yannick; Keller, Laurent (2010). "Parasitoid Wasps: From Natural History to Genomic Studies". Current Biology. 20 (5): R242–R244. doi: 10.1016/j.cub.2010.01.027 . PMID   20219176. S2CID   1015321.
  5. ↑ "Model Organisms". INsecTIME. Archived from the original on 26 March 2017.
  6. 1 2 Raychoudhury, R; Desjardins, C A; Buellesbach, J; Loehlin, D W; Grillenberger, B K; Beukeboom, L; Schmitt, T; Werren, J H (2010). "Behavioral and genetic characteristics of a new species of Nasonia". Heredity. 104 (3): 278–288. doi:10.1038/hdy.2009.147. PMC   3533498 . PMID   20087394.
  7. ↑ Ruther, Joachim; Hammerl, Theresa (2014). "An Oral Male Courtship Pheromone Terminates the Response of Nasonia vitripennis Females to the Male-Produced Sex Attractant". Journal of Chemical Ecology. 40 (1): 56–62. doi:10.1007/s10886-013-0372-2. PMID   24369389. S2CID   6671115.
  8. ↑ Heimpel, George E.; de Boer, Jetske G. (2008). "Sex Determination in the Hymenoptera". Annual Review of Entomology. 53: 209–230. doi:10.1146/annurev.ento.53.103106.093441. PMID   17803453.
  9. ↑ Zou, Yuan et al. “A chimeric gene paternally instructs female sex determination in the haplodiploid wasp Nasonia.” Science 370 (2020): 1115 - 1118.
  10. 1 2 Oliveira, Deodoro C. S. G.; Raychoudhury, Rhitoban; Lavrov, Dennis V.; Werren, John H. (2008). "Rapidly Evolving Mitochondrial Genome and Directional Selection in Mitochondrial Genes in the Parasitic Wasp Nasonia (Hymenoptera: Pteromalidae)". Molecular Biology and Evolution. 25 (10): 2167–2180. doi:10.1093/molbev/msn159. PMC   2727384 . PMID   18653734.
  11. ↑ van Opijnen, T.; Baudry, E.; Baldo, L.; Bartos, J.; Werren, J.H. (9 November 2005). "Genetic variability in the three genomes of Nasonia: nuclear, mitochondrial and Wolbachia". Insect Molecular Biology. 14 (6): 653–663. doi:10.1111/j.1365-2583.2005.00595.x. PMID   16313565. S2CID   26046023.
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