Journal
PROCEEDINGS OF THE NATIONAL ACADEMY OF SCIENCES OF THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA
Volume 108, Issue 14, Pages 5679-5684Publisher
NATL ACAD SCIENCES
DOI: 10.1073/pnas.1009690108
Keywords
social insect; caste differences; nonmodel organism; de novo genome assembly
Categories
Funding
- European Union [FP6 036894]
- University of Lausanne
- Rectorate of the University of Lausanne
- ERC
- Herbette Foundation
- US Department of Agriculture Agriculture and Food Research Initiative Award [2009-35302-05301]
- Infectigen grant
- Academy of Finland [122210]
- National Science Foundation [DEB-0640690, MCB-0950896, DEB-1011349]
- Danish National Research Foundation
- Bureau of Animal and Plant Health Inspection and Quarantine, Council of Agriculture, Executive Yuan, Taiwan [98AS-9.1.2BQ-B1(1)]
- Swiss National Science Foundation [315230B-131083]
- Picker Interdisciplinary Science Institute, Colgate University
- Swiss National Science Foundation (SNF) [315230B_131083] Funding Source: Swiss National Science Foundation (SNF)
- Direct For Biological Sciences
- Division Of Environmental Biology [1011349] Funding Source: National Science Foundation
- Direct For Biological Sciences
- Division Of Integrative Organismal Systems [1021723] Funding Source: National Science Foundation
- Div Of Molecular and Cellular Bioscience
- Direct For Biological Sciences [0950896] Funding Source: National Science Foundation
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Ants have evolved very complex societies and are key ecosystem members. Some ants, such as the fire ant Solenopsis invicta, are also major pests. Here, we present a draft genome of S. invicta, assembled from Roche 454 and Illumina sequencing reads obtained from a focal haploid male and his brothers. We used comparative genomic methods to obtain insight into the unique features of the S. invicta genome. For example, we found that this genome harbors four adjacent copies of vitellogenin. A phylogenetic analysis revealed that an ancestral vitellogenin gene first underwent a duplication that was followed by possibly independent duplications of each of the daughter vitellogenins. The vitellogenin genes have undergone subfunctionalization with queen-and worker-specific expression, possibly reflecting differential selection acting on the queen and worker castes. Additionally, we identified more than 400 putative olfactory receptors of which at least 297 are intact. This represents the largest repertoire reported so far in insects. S. invicta also harbors an expansion of a specific family of lipid-processing genes, two putative orthologs to the transformer/feminizer sex differentiation gene, a functional DNA methylation system, and a single putative telomerase ortholog. EST data indicate that this S. invicta telomerase ortholog has at least four spliceforms that differ in their use of two sets of mutually exclusive exons. Some of these and other unique aspects of the fire ant genome are likely linked to the complex social behavior of this species.
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