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Diversity of Wolbachia Associated with the Giant Turtle Ant, Cephalotes atratus

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Abstract

Symbiotic relationships between organisms are common throughout the tree of life, and often these organisms share an evolutionary history. In turtle ants (Cephalotes), symbiotic associations with bacteria are known to be especially important for supplementing the nutrients that their herbivorous diets do not provide. However, much remains unknown about the diversity of many common bacterial symbionts with turtle ants, such as Wolbachia. Here, we surveyed the diversity of Wolbachia, focusing on one species of turtle ant with a particularly wide geographic range, Cephalotes atratus. Colonies were collected from the entire range of C. atratus, and we detected the presence of Wolbachia by sequencing multiple individuals per colony for wsp. Then, using the multilocus sequence typing (MLST) approach, we determined each individual’s unique sequence type (ST) based on comparison to sequences published in the Wolbachia MLST Database (https://pubmlst.org/wolbachia/). The results of this study suggest that there is a high level of diversity of Wolbachia strains among colonies from different regions, while the diversity within colonies is very low. Additionally, 13 novel variants (alleles) were uncovered. These results suggest that the level of diversity of Wolbachia within species is affected by geography, and the high level of diversity observed among Cephalotes atratus populations may be explained by their wide geographic range.

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Acknowledgements

We thank the National Science Foundation Research Experiences for Undergraduates (REU) program for making this opportunity possible (NSF DBI 1559779). This work was also supported by a grant from the National Science Foundation to C.S.M. (NSF DEB 1900357).

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Department of Science and Education, Integrative Research Center, Field Museum of Natural History, 1400 South Lake Shore Drive, Chicago, IL, USA

    Madeleine Kelly, Shauna L. Price, Manuela de Oliveira Ramalho & Corrie S. Moreau

  2. Harvard University, Cambridge, MA, USA

    Madeleine Kelly

  3. Department of Entomology, Cornell University, 129 Garden Ave, Ithaca, NY, 14850, USA

    Manuela de Oliveira Ramalho & Corrie S. Moreau

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  1. Madeleine Kelly
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Correspondence to Manuela de Oliveira Ramalho.

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Kelly, M., Price, S.L., de Oliveira Ramalho, M. et al. Diversity of Wolbachia Associated with the Giant Turtle Ant, Cephalotes atratus. Curr Microbiol 76, 1330–1337 (2019). https://doi.org/10.1007/s00284-019-01722-8

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