Researcher Detects Threatening RVX-208 Dependency

Unlike free-living and pathogenic bacteria, louse primary endosymbionts cannot be cultured and classified with traditional microbiological methods. Sequencing of the 16S rRNA gene by PCR has provided valuable insights into the diversity of primary endosymbionts of all insects. Recent studies have shown that lice house distantly related primary endosymbionts that are closely related to other insect symbionts and pathogens. Although this work has added to our understanding of louse primary endosymbiosis, the A/T-rich and low-complexity regions prevalent in insect endosymbiont genomes often limit PCR techniques. The recent publication of the genome of C.?Riesia pediculicola revealed a small genome, 574?kB, similar to what is BMS-777607 molecular weight found in other insect primary endosymbionts [7]. Genomes of this size can easily be RVX-208 sequenced at low cost with current high-throughput sequencing technologies. Although primary endosymbiont bacteria cannot easily be separated from louse tissues, supercomputers and metagenomic algorithms allow for parsing of mixed short-read pools. These technologies have brought whole genome sequences of louse primary endosymbionts within reach, with respect to both budget and time. An initiative to sequence multiple genomes of louse primary endosymbionts would provide additional markers for phylogenetic analysis and insights into the symbiotic interaction between louse and bacteria. Although 16S rRNA is a valuable resource, Novakova et?al. [33] and Comas et?al. [41] have both highlighted the importance of using multiple phylogenetic markers when reconstructing the evolutionary history of endosymbionts. Additional markers would provide additional resolution in closely related taxa, and the recent explosion of publically available bacterial genomes would make multigene phylogeny building feasible. Unlike the recent queries into the evolutionary history of louse primary selleck endosymbionts, very few attempts have been made to describe the nutritional role that the primary endosymbiont provides for its louse host, and vice?versa. Past endosymbiont removal experiments, such as that conducted by Puchta [25], may not be possible for many species of lice. Whole genome sequences would provide new insights on which we can build hypotheses of metabolic provisioning via metabolites (and potentially proteins) to both the louse host and primary endosymbiont. Collectively, these two lines of study would provide insights into how distantly related endosymbionts come to inhabit louse mycetomes and act as primary endosymbionts engaged in metabolite provisioning. Ultimately, we will learn whether these disparate bacteria have used similar means to provide for their host. Recent molecular data and increasingly sophisticated phylogenetic analyses are challenging our hypotheses of the evolutionary history of parasitic lice.