Natures wonders: whitefly pest with horizontal transfer (Introduction)

by David Turell , Tuesday, February 06, 2024, 15:59 (81 days ago) @ David Turell

Using bacterial genes to feed:

https://mail.google.com/mail/u/0/#inbox/FMfcgzGxRdtjZxNbRhvmpSkhsddFrpsw

"All living things need nitrogen to make proteins and other essential molecules. Most organisms have different ways of processing the nitrogen they obtain, which can limit their ability to eat either high- or low-nitrogen foods. However, that’s not an issue for the whitefly (Bemisia tabaci), a global agricultural pest—and it turns out it can thank a pair of genes it snagged from bacteria for that.

"With nitrogen, it’s all about balance: You need enough to make everything you need, but not too much. Many of the molecules created in the process of converting dietary nitrogen into cellular building material are toxic (we excrete excess nitrogen as urea, for instance). This means that most animals have a somewhat narrow window of what foods hit the nitrogen sweet spot. But whiteflies can consume a stunning diversity of plants which vary greatly in their nitrogen content. This is because the insects can not only efficiently create waste compounds to rid themselves of excess nitrogen, but they can also store this waste and pull nitrogen from it when their meals come up short. They owe this ability to two bacterial enzymes that became incorporated into their genome, a new study finds.

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"When the researchers shut down the production of these enzymes, the whiteflies struggled on high-nitrogen foods—a potential new avenue for pest control."

The original article:

https://www.science.org/doi/10.1126/sciadv.adi3105?utm_source=sfmc&utm_medium=email...

"Nitrogen is an essential element for all life on earth. Nitrogen metabolism, including excretion, is essential for growth, development, and survival of plants and animals alike. Several nitrogen metabolic processes have been described, but the underlying molecular mechanisms are unclear. Here, we reveal a unique process of nitrogen metabolism in the whitefly Bemisia tabaci, a global pest. We show that it has acquired two bacterial uricolytic enzyme genes, B. tabaci urea carboxylase (BtUCA) and B. tabaci allophanate hydrolase (BtAtzF), through horizontal gene transfer. These genes operate in conjunction to not only coordinate an efficient way of metabolizing nitrogenous waste but also control B. tabaci’s exceptionally flexible nitrogen recycling capacity. Its efficient nitrogen processing explains how this important pest can feed on a vast spectrum of plants. This finding provides insight into how the hijacking of microbial genes has allowed whiteflies to develop a highly economic and stable nitrogen metabolism network and offers clues for pest management strategies."

Comment: horizontal gene transfer remains a major evolutionary mechanism.