TY - JOUR T1 - Tetraponera ants have gut symbionts related to nitrogen-fixing root-nodule bacteria. JF - Proc Biol Sci Y1 - 2002 A1 - Steven Van Borm A1 - Buschinger, Alfred A1 - Boomsma, Jacobus J A1 - Billen, Johan KW - Animals KW - ants KW - bacteria KW - Female KW - Intestines KW - Male KW - Nitrogen Fixation KW - Phylogeny KW - RNA, Bacterial KW - RNA, Ribosomal, 16S KW - symbiosis AB -

Some Tetraponera ants (Formicidae, Pseudomyrmecinae) subsist almost entirely on amino acid deficient honeydew secretions of pseudococcids and harbour a dense aggregation of bacterial symbionts in a unique pouch-shaped organ at the junction of the midgut and the intestine. The organ is surrounded by a network of intruding tracheae and Malpighian tubules, suggesting that these bacteria are involved in the oxidative recycling of nitrogen-rich metabolic waste. We have examined the ultrastructure of these bacteria and have amplified, cloned and sequenced ribosomal RNA-encoding genes, showing that the ant pouch contains a series of close relatives of Flavobacteria and Rhizobium, Methylobacterium, Burkholderia and Pseudomonas nitrogen-fixing root-nodule bacteria. We argue that pouch bacteria have been repeatedly 'domesticated' by the ants as nitrogen-recycling endosymbionts. This ant-associated community of mutualists is, to our knowledge, the first finding of symbionts related to root-nodule bacteria in animals.

VL - 269 CP - 1504 U1 - https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/12396501?dopt=Abstract M3 - 10.1098/rspb.2002.2101 ER -