{"title":"Impact of Species and Developmental Stage on the Bacterial Communities of Aphaenogaster Ants.","authors":"Lily A Kelleher, Manuela O Ramalho","doi":"10.1007/s00284-025-04128-x","DOIUrl":null,"url":null,"abstract":"<p><p>Ants are distributed across the globe and there are currently over 14,000 described species. Due to the high diversity between species, ants are considered vital keystone species to many ecosystems. They provide basic ecosystem services such as: seed dispersal, soil bioturbation, decomposition, and pest control. Within these ecosystems ants form complex symbiotic relationships with plants, fungi, and bacteria. Studying the interaction between ants and their bacteria is important because of the crucial role that microbes play in the overall health of ants. Aphaenogaster Mayr, 1853, which is a globally distributed ant genus, remains understudied in terms of their bacterial community. This study aims to determine the taxonomic composition and abundance of the Aphaenogaster bacterial community and to determine if development stage and species impact the bacterial community composition. For this study, ants from several colonies were collected from the Gordon Natural Area in West Chester, Pennsylvania, USA. DNA was then extracted from the ants in all stages of development and the 16S rRNA gene was amplified and sequencing following the NGS amplicon approach. The findings from this study reveal that species and development stage have a significant impact upon the bacterial community composition and abundance of Aphaenogaster ants, and Wolbachia is highly associated with these ants.</p>","PeriodicalId":11360,"journal":{"name":"Current Microbiology","volume":"82 4","pages":"157"},"PeriodicalIF":2.3000,"publicationDate":"2025-02-26","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":"0","resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":null,"PeriodicalName":"Current Microbiology","FirstCategoryId":"99","ListUrlMain":"https://doi.org/10.1007/s00284-025-04128-x","RegionNum":3,"RegionCategory":"生物学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":null,"EPubDate":"","PubModel":"","JCR":"Q3","JCRName":"MICROBIOLOGY","Score":null,"Total":0}
引用次数: 0
Abstract
Ants are distributed across the globe and there are currently over 14,000 described species. Due to the high diversity between species, ants are considered vital keystone species to many ecosystems. They provide basic ecosystem services such as: seed dispersal, soil bioturbation, decomposition, and pest control. Within these ecosystems ants form complex symbiotic relationships with plants, fungi, and bacteria. Studying the interaction between ants and their bacteria is important because of the crucial role that microbes play in the overall health of ants. Aphaenogaster Mayr, 1853, which is a globally distributed ant genus, remains understudied in terms of their bacterial community. This study aims to determine the taxonomic composition and abundance of the Aphaenogaster bacterial community and to determine if development stage and species impact the bacterial community composition. For this study, ants from several colonies were collected from the Gordon Natural Area in West Chester, Pennsylvania, USA. DNA was then extracted from the ants in all stages of development and the 16S rRNA gene was amplified and sequencing following the NGS amplicon approach. The findings from this study reveal that species and development stage have a significant impact upon the bacterial community composition and abundance of Aphaenogaster ants, and Wolbachia is highly associated with these ants.
期刊介绍:
Current Microbiology is a well-established journal that publishes articles in all aspects of microbial cells and the interactions between the microorganisms, their hosts and the environment.
Current Microbiology publishes original research articles, short communications, reviews and letters to the editor, spanning the following areas:
physiology, biochemistry, genetics, genomics, biotechnology, ecology, evolution, morphology, taxonomy, diagnostic methods, medical and clinical microbiology and immunology as applied to microorganisms.