title: Diversity and functional significance of cellulolytic microbes living in termite, pill-bug and stem-borer guts.
abstract: Arthropods living on plants are able to digest plant biomass with the help of microbial flora in their guts. This study considered three arthropods from different niches - termites, pill-bugs and yellow stem-borers - and screened their guts for cellulase producing microbes. Among 42 unique cellulase-producing strains, 50% belonged to Bacillaceae, 26% belonged to Enterobacteriaceae, 17% belonged to Microbacteriaceae, 5% belonged to Paenibacillaceae and 2% belonged to Promicromonosporaceae. The distribution of microbial families in the three arthropod guts reflected differences in their food consumption habits. Most of the carboxymethylcellulase positive strains also hydrolysed other amorphous substrates such as xylan, locust bean gum and β-D-glucan. Two strains, A11 and A21, demonstrated significant activity towards Avicel and p-nitrophenyl-β-D-cellobiose, indicating that they express cellobiohydrolase. These results provide insight into the co-existence of symbionts in the guts of arthropods and their possible exploitation for the production of fuels and chemicals derived from plant biomass.
authors.affiliation: Synthetic Biology and Biofuels Group, Aruna Asaf Ali Marg, New Delhi, India.
authors.forename: Zeenat
authors.initials: Z
authors.lastname: Bashir
authors.forename: Vamsi Krishna
authors.initials: VK
authors.lastname: Kondapalli
authors.forename: Nidhi
authors.initials: N
authors.lastname: Adlakha
authors.forename: Anil
authors.initials: A
authors.lastname: Sharma
authors.forename: Raj K
authors.initials: RK
authors.lastname: Bhatnagar
authors.forename: Girish
authors.initials: G
authors.lastname: Chandel
authors.forename: Syed Shams
authors.initials: SS
authors.lastname: Yazdani
mesh_terms: D000818:Animals; D001181:Arthropods / Q000382:microbiology* / Q000502:physiology*; D018407:Bacterial Physiological Phenomena; D002482:Cellulose / Q000378:metabolism*; D041981:Gastrointestinal Tract / Q000378:metabolism* / Q000382:microbiology*; D064307:Microbiota / Q000502:physiology*
chemical_list: D002482:Cellulose