EAGER: Poison Frogs and Toxic Arthropods – Diversification and parallel evolution of frog predators with their alkaloid-bearing prey

渴望：毒蛙和有毒节肢动物 – 青蛙捕食者与其含有生物碱的猎物的多样化和平行进化

• 批准号: 2016372
• 负责人: Juan Santos Garcia
• 金额: $ 19.99万
• 依托单位: Saint John's University
• 依托单位国家: 美国
• 项目类别: Standard Grant
• 财政年份: 2020
• 资助国家: 美国
• 起止时间: 2020-03-15 至 2022-02-28
• 项目状态: 已结题
• 来源: https://www.nsf.gov/awardsearch/showAward?AWD_ID=2016372&HistoricalAwards=false
• 关键词: EAGER; Poison; Frogs; Toxic; Arthropods

Poison frogs have venomous substances in their skins, but they do not produce these chemicals on their own. Instead, they harvest these venoms from their arthropod diet: ants and mites. More than 800 different chemicals were found in these frogs. However, the diversity of ants and mites is so vast that understanding how poison frogs gain toxins from their arthropod food remains a mystery. This project will examine the connection between frog predators and toxic arthropods, which are valued more by the toxins they contain than by their nutritional value. This project will examine the diversity, genetics and evolution of toxic arthropods and their poison frog predators. The relevance of this project resides on the discovery of new knowledge that can then be shared with the community to advance our understanding of megadiverse regions like the South American rain forest. This basic research will provide insights into how the recycling of toxins occurs in natural ecosystems. The research team (St. John’s University, European and Latin-American partners) will provide learning experiences to underrepresented groups in STEM with workshops for students and open lectures for the public in NYC and beyond. SJU is an institution in the heart of the most ethnographically diverse county in the US with a large concentration of minority students. This work will involve training these scholars in tropical ecology, genomics and bioinformatics.Chemical defenses in poison frogs have a well-documented dietary origin. Yet little is known about the functional, phylogenomic biodiversity and ecological processes that connect the toxic arthropod base with their poison frog consumers. The movement of such defenses in trophic chains requires an intricate ecosystem of connections among interacting species. To answer this question, this project examines a model system centered on a section of the trophic chain that includes poison frogs and their alkaloid-bearing arthropod diet. The project addresses two major evolutionary and ecological dimensions: (1) phylogenomic and alkaloid diversities across poison frogs and their dietary ants and mites and (2) transcriptomics, physiological adaptations and evolutionary parallelisms evidenced by differential gene expression among the origins of alkaloid sequestration in poison frogs and their toxic arthropod diet. These goals will address how parallelisms, coevolution/codiversification and convergence evolved in poison frogs and their toxic arthropod under the context of bioaccumulation, differential gene expression and gene diversification. Such comparisons will contribute to a new level of understanding of the cycling of defensive toxins across biodiverse Neotropical communities. The proposed research will use predator-prey dynamics involving chemical defenses in some of the most threatened ecosystems, the Chocoan and Amazonian tropical forests, where biodiversity is being lost daily.This award reflects NSF's statutory mission and has been deemed worthy of support through evaluation using the Foundation's intellectual merit and broader impacts review criteria.

毒蛙的皮肤中含有有毒物质，但它们自己不会产生这些化学物质。相反，他们从节肢动物的食物中获取这些毒液：蚂蚁和螨虫。在这些青蛙中发现了800多种不同的化学物质。然而，蚂蚁和螨虫的多样性是如此之大，以至于了解毒蛙如何从节肢动物食物中获得毒素仍然是一个谜。这个项目将研究青蛙捕食者和有毒节肢动物之间的联系，它们所含的毒素比它们的营养价值更有价值。本项目将研究有毒节肢动物及其毒蛙捕食者的多样性、遗传学和进化。这个项目的相关性在于发现新的知识，然后可以与社区分享，以促进我们对南美洲雨林等巨型生物多样性地区的了解。这项基础研究将深入了解毒素在自然生态系统中的循环过程。该研究团队（圣约翰大学，欧洲和拉丁美洲合作伙伴）将为STEM中代表性不足的群体提供学习经验，为学生举办研讨会，并为纽约市及其他地区的公众举办公开讲座。SJU是一所位于美国最具民族多样性的县中心的机构，少数民族学生集中。这项工作将涉及培训这些学者在热带生态学，基因组学和生物信息学。化学防御在毒蛙有一个良好的记录饮食起源。然而，人们对将有毒节肢动物基地与其毒蛙消费者联系起来的功能性、生物基因组生物多样性和生态过程知之甚少。这种防御在营养链中的运动需要一个相互作用的物种之间复杂的生态系统。为了回答这个问题，该项目检查了一个以营养链的一部分为中心的模型系统，其中包括毒蛙及其含生物碱的节肢动物饮食。该项目涉及两个主要的进化和生态方面：（1）毒蛙及其饮食蚂蚁和螨类之间的基因组和生物碱差异，以及（2）转录组学，生理适应和进化平行性，由毒蛙及其有毒节肢动物饮食中生物碱螯合起源之间的差异基因表达证明。这些目标将探讨在生物累积、差异基因表达和基因多样化的背景下，毒蛙及其有毒节肢动物的平行性、共同进化/共同多样化和趋同性是如何演变的。这样的比较将有助于一个新的水平的理解防御毒素循环的生物多样性新热带社区。该研究计划将利用捕食者-猎物动态，涉及一些最受威胁的生态系统中的化学防御，如Chocoan和Amazonian热带森林，那里的生物多样性每天都在丧失。该奖项反映了NSF的法定使命，并通过使用基金会的知识价值和更广泛的影响审查标准进行评估，被认为值得支持。

项目成果

A new species of Leucostethus (Anura: Dendrobatidae) from the Cordillera Mache-Chindul in northwestern Ecuador, with comments on similar Colostethus and Hyloxalus

来自厄瓜多尔西北部马赫-钦杜尔山脉的 Leucostethus 新种（无尾：Dendrobatidae），以及对类似的 Colostethus 和 Hyloxalus 的评论

• 发表时间: 2020
• 期刊: Zootaxa
• 影响因子: 0.9
• 作者: Vigle, G.O.

ExplorATE: a new pipeline to explore active transposable elements from RNA-seq data

ExplorATE：从 RNA-seq 数据中探索活性转座元件的新管道

• DOI: 10.1093/bioinformatics/btac354
• 发表时间: 2022
• 期刊: Bioinformatics
• 影响因子: 5.8
• 作者: Femenias, Martin M.;Santos, Juan C.;Sites, Jr, Jack W.;Avila, Luciano J.;Morando, Mariana;Kendziorski, ed., Christina
• 通讯作者: Kendziorski, ed., Christina