Fine-Scale Genetic Mapping and Sequence Analysis of Genes Involved in Honey Bee Stinging Behavior

蜜蜂蛰刺行为相关基因的精细定位和遗传分析摘要行为性状的遗传结构（基因数量及其影响）是行为生态学领域的一个重要考虑因素，但对这一主题知之甚少。 蜜蜂在这方面可能是有用的，因为它正在被公认为行为和行为遗传学研究的模式生物。 作为一种行为遗传模型，蜜蜂具有易于培养、社会行为、单倍体雄性和有史以来报告的后生动物重组率最高的优点。 高减数分裂重组率有利于构建详细的遗传图谱和克隆基因的基础上，他们在遗传图谱上的位置，因为遗传距离直接相关的交叉率。 拟议的项目旨在研究特定基因和信息素通信在蜜蜂防御行为中的作用。 先前的研究确定并绘制了数量性状基因座（QTL），这些基因座标记了影响群体水平行为性状的基因的位置，即蜜蜂在行为测定中沉积的蜇刺数量。 还鉴定了影响报警信息素产生的QTL。 随后发现了两个“蜇刺”QTL影响个体蜜蜂的防卫和蜇刺行为，从而证实了QTL对行为的影响。 这两个QTL中的一个也可能对报警信息素的产生有影响。 一个QTL，影响水平的一个未知的报警信息素成分，与殖民地刺痛反应映射接近这个防御行为QTL。拟议的研究将进一步表征QTL对个体和群体行为表型的影响，并寻求确定受每个基因影响的行为的特定组成部分。 此外，与单倍体雄性杂交将允许进一步的遗传解剖，以更精确地定位基因的位置，并最终获得这些基因的序列。 这些杂交将产生蜜蜂的品系，每一个品系都是从不同的单倍体雄性蜜蜂传下来的。 单倍体父本在QTL附近的关键区域将彼此不同。 这项研究的下一步是鉴定蜜蜂DNA的大型细菌人工染色体（BAC）克隆，这些克隆跨越含有QTL的区域。 例如，如果影响行为性状的基因可以精确到5厘摩的遗传距离，这代表了蜜蜂DNA的约250个碱基（Kb）。 这个250 Kb的区域可以由几个BAC克隆跨越，因为目前蜜蜂BAC文库的平均克隆大小为113 Kb。 然后将使用测序和生物信息学分析来鉴定这些QTL的候选基因。

Fine-scale mapping and genetic analysis of genes involved in honey bee stinging behavior.ABSTRACT The genetic architecture (numbers of genes and their effects) of behavioral traits is an important consideration for the field of behavioral ecology, yet little is known on this topic. The honey bee may be useful in this regard because it is becoming recognized as a model organism for behavioral and behavioral genetic studies. As a behavioral genetic model, the bee has the advantages of ease of culture, social behavior, haploid males, and the highest recombination rate ever reported for a metazoan. The high meiotic recombination rate facilitates the construction of detailed genetic maps and cloning genes based on their positions on genetic maps because genetic distance is directly related to crossover rates. The proposed project seeks to study the role of specific genes and pheromonal communication in honey bee defensive behavior. Previous studies identified and mapped quantitative trait loci (QTL) that mark the positions of genes that influence a colony-level behavioral trait, the numbers of stings that bees deposited in a behavioral assay. QTL that influence alarm pheromone production were also identified. Two of the "stinging" QTL were subsequently found to influence the guarding and stinging behavior of individual bees, thus confirming the QTL effects on behavior. One of the two confirmed QTL also may have an influence on alarm pheromone production. A QTL that influences levels of an unknown alarm pheromone component that correlated with colony stinging response mapped close to this defensive-behavior QTL. The proposed research would further characterize QTL effects on individual and colony behavioral phenotypes and seek to identify specific components of behavior that are influenced by each gene. In addition, crosses with haploid males would allow for further genetic dissection to pinpoint the location of genes more precisely and ultimately obtain the sequence of these genes. These crosses would generate lines of bees, each of which is descended from a different haploid male. The haploid fathers will differ from each other in key regions near the QTL. The next step in the proposed research is to identify large bacterial artificial chromosome (BAC) clones of honey bee DNA that span the region containing the QTL. For example, if the gene influencing the behavioral trait can be pinpointed to 5 centimorgans of genetic distance, this represents about 250 kilobases (Kb) of honey bee DNA. This 250 Kb region can be spanned by just a few BAC clones because the current honey bee BAC library has average clone sizes of 113 Kb. Sequencing and bio-informatic analyses would then be used to identify candidate genes for these QTL.