Metagenomic analysis of stingless bees in the Philippines
2018
Mascareñas-Bautista, Ma.A. | Ballesteros, J.T. | Mostoles, D.J. | Manuel, Ma.C.C.
Stingless bees, Tetragonula sp. (HYmenoptera:Apidae), are native to the Philippines and are key pollinators that remote sustainability in agroecology. Along with Apis sp. and Bambus sp., they are described as eusocial corbiculates with highly specialized gut microbial communities attributed to their social behavior. These gut microbiomes influence the development immunity, nutrition, and overall health status to their hosts and are able to subsist long-term as host-adapted symbiont lineages. Metagenomics with the aid of next-generation sequencing, provides an efficient and high-throughput method to catalog the entire composition of gut microbial communities and elucidate their relative function in the host. Gut microbiome of stingless bees, Tetragonula sp., from Bicol region, the Philippines were analyzed using metagenomics. For library preparation, the DNA samples were amplified using Illumina MiSeq-specific 16S V3V4 primers, then libraries were normalized and sequenced in a 2x300 cycle run. 16S rRNA sequencing reads were processed and analyzed using QIIME taxonomic units and predominant microbial phylotypes like Proteobacteria, Firmicutes, and Bacteriodetes across different colonies, and among closely related genera Apis and Bombus. Similarities among gut microbiomes of stingless bees from different colonies at different locations imply persistence of conserved microbial phylotypes. Variations on other phylotypes across colonies suggest how differences in external factors, like food source and climate, may influence gut microbiome diversity. Future directions include validating data using other metagenomic analysis software and databases.
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