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PMID: 18043642 Published · ppublish English Journal Article Research Support, Non-U.S. Gov't Research Support, U.S. Gov't, Non-P.H.S.

Symbiont recognition of mutualistic bacteria by Acromyrmex leaf-cutting ants.

The ISME journal ·Vol. 1 ·No. 4 ·2007-08-00 ·Pages 313-20

Zhang MM, Poulsen M, Currie CR

Abstract

Symbiont choice has been proposed to play an important role in shaping many symbiotic relationships, including the fungus-growing ant-microbe mutualism. Over millions of years, fungus-growing ants have defended their fungus gardens from specialized parasites with antibiotics produced by an actinomycete bacterial mutualist (genus Pseudonocardia). Despite the potential of being infected by phylogenetically diverse strains of parasites, each ant colony maintains only a single Pseudonocardia symbiont strain, which is primarily vertically transmitted between colonies by the founding queens. In this study, we show that Acromyrmex leaf-cutter ants are able to differentiate between their native actinomycete strain and a variety of foreign strains isolated from sympatric and allopatric Acromyrmex species, in addition to strains originating from other fungus-growing ant genera. The recognition mechanism is sufficiently sensitive for the ants to discriminate between closely related symbiont strains. Our findings suggest that symbiont recognition may play a crucial role in the fungus-growing ant-bacterium mutualism, likely allowing the ants to retain ecological flexibility necessary for defending their garden from diverse parasites and, at the same time, resolve potential conflict that can arise from rearing competing symbiont strains.

MeSH Terms

Actinomycetales/classification,physiology Animals Ants/microbiology Bacterial Proteins/genetics Biological Evolution Molecular Sequence Data Peptide Elongation Factor Tu/genetics Phylogeny RNA, Bacterial/genetics RNA, Ribosomal, 16S/genetics Species Specificity Symbiosis

Chemicals

Bacterial Proteins RNA, Bacterial RNA, Ribosomal, 16S Peptide Elongation Factor Tu

Authors & Affiliations

3 authors, click to expand affiliations / ORCID

Zhang Mingzi M

Department of Bacteriology, University of Wisconsin-Madison, Madison, WI 53706, USA.

Poulsen Michael

Currie Cameron R

Article Info

Journal

The ISME journal

Abbr.

ISME J

ISSN

1751-7362

DOI

10.1038/ismej.2007.41

Published

2007-08-00

Epub

2007-00-07

Pages

313-20

Language

English

Region

England

NLM ID

101301086

Subset

Databases

GENBANK

EF588205, EF588206, EF588207, EF588208, EF588209, EF588210, EF588211, EF588212, EF588213, EF588214, EF588215, EF588216, EF588217, EF588218, EF588219, EF588220, EF588221, EF588222, EF588223, EF588224, EF588225, EF588226, EF588227, EF588228, EF588229, EF588230, EF588231, EF588232, EF588233, EF588234, EF588235, EF588236, EF588237, EF588238, EF588239, EF588240, EF588241, EF588242, EF588243, EF588244, EF588245, EF588246, EF588247, EF588248, EF588249, EF588250, EF588251, EF588252, EF588253, EF588254, EF588255, EF588256, EF588257, EF588258, EF588259, EF588260, EF588261, EF588262

External Links

PubMed source DOI: 10.1038/ismej.2007.41 View journal details

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Symbiont recognition of mutualistic bacteria by Acromyrmex leaf-cutting ants.

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