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Spatial distribution and community structure of microbiota associated with cowpea aphid (Aphis craccivora Koch)

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Abstract

Aphid populations were collected on cowpea, dolichos, redgram and black gram from Belagavi and Udupi locations. The samples were shotgun sequenced using the Illumina NovaSeq 6000 system to understand the spatial distribution and community structure of microbiota (especially bacteria) associated with aphids. In the present study, we identified obligatory nutritional symbiont Buchnera aphidicola and facultative symbionts Rickettsia sp. and Bacteroidetes endosymbiont of Geopemphigus sp. in all the aphid samples studied, although in varied abundance. On the other hand, Serratia symbiotica, Arsenophonus sp. and Acinetobacter sp. were only found in aphids on specific host plants, suggesting that host plants might influence the bacterial community structure. Furthermore, our study revealed that microbiota other than bacteria were highly insignificant in the aphid populations. Additionally, functional annotation of aphid metagenomes identified several pathways and enzymes involved in various physiological and ecological functions. Amino acid and vitamin biosynthesis-related pathways were predominant than carbohydrate metabolism, owing to their feeding habit and nutritional requirement. Chaperones related to stress tolerance such as GroEL and DnaK were identified. Enzymes involved in toxic chemical metabolisms such as glutathione transferase, phosphodiesterases and ABC transferases were observed. These enzymes may confer resistance to pesticides in the aphid populations. Overall, our results support the importance of host plants in structuring bacterial communities in aphids and show the functional roles of symbionts in aphid survival and development. Thus, these findings can be the basis for further detailed investigations and devising better strategies to manage the pests in field conditions.

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Data availability

The raw shotgun metagenomic sequence data of the present study was deposited in the NCBI SRA database with the SRA Accession Numbers: SRR14744453—SRR14744457 under the BioProject PRJNA735325.

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Acknowledgements

This study was funded by the Empowerment and Equity Opportunities for Excellence in Science (EMEQ) Grant (Project Number: EEQ/2017/000726) of Science and Engineering Research Board (SERB), Department of Science & Technology, Government of India to Shivanna B. We thank Dr. Sunil Joshi, Principal Scientist, ICAR-NBAIR, Bengaluru, for the taxonomic identification of aphid samples. We are greatly thankful to Molsys Pvt. Ltd., Bangalore, for their guidance during metagenomic analysis.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Insect Molecular Biology Laboratory, Department of Agricultural Entomology, University of Agricultural Sciences, Bangalore, 560065, India

    Madhusudan M. Pawar, B. Shivanna & N. H. Meenakshi

  2. Plant PathoGenOmic Laboratory, Department of Plant Pathology, University of Agricultural Sciences, Bangalore, 560065, India

    M. K. Prasannakumar & P. Buela Parivallal

  3. Department of Ecophysiology, University of Bonn, 53115, Bonn, Germany

    Kiran Suresh

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  1. Madhusudan M. Pawar
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SB conceived the idea and designed the study, MMP and MNH performed the experiment, MMP analysed the results and drafted the manuscript, and MKP, SB, PBP, and KS revised the manuscript. All authors read and approved the final manuscript.

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Correspondence to M. K. Prasannakumar.

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Pawar, M.M., Shivanna, B., Prasannakumar, M.K. et al. Spatial distribution and community structure of microbiota associated with cowpea aphid (Aphis craccivora Koch). 3 Biotech 12, 75 (2022). https://doi.org/10.1007/s13205-022-03142-1

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