title: The fungus-growing termite Macrotermes natalensis harbors bacillaene-producing Bacillus sp. that inhibit potentially antagonistic fungi.
abstract: The ancient fungus-growing termite (Mactrotermitinae) symbiosis involves the obligate association between a lineage of higher termites and basidiomycete Termitomyces cultivar fungi. Our investigation of the fungus-growing termite Macrotermes natalensis shows that Bacillus strains from M. natalensis colonies produce a single major antibiotic, bacillaene A (1), which selectively inhibits known and putatively antagonistic fungi of Termitomyces. Comparative analyses of the genomes of symbiotic Bacillus strains revealed that they are phylogenetically closely related to Bacillus subtilis, their genomes have high homology with more than 90% of ORFs being 100% identical, and the sequence identities across the biosynthetic gene cluster for bacillaene are higher between termite-associated strains than to the cluster previously reported in B. subtilis. Our findings suggest that this lineage of antibiotic-producing Bacillus may be a defensive symbiont involved in the protection of the fungus-growing termite cultivar.
authors.affiliation: Natural Products Research Institute, College of Pharmacy, Seoul National University, 1 Gwanak-ro, Gwanak-gu, Seoul 151-742, Republic of Korea.
authors.forename: Soohyun
authors.initials: S
authors.lastname: Um
authors.forename: Antoine
authors.initials: A
authors.lastname: Fraimout
authors.forename: Panagiotis
authors.initials: P
authors.lastname: Sapountzis
authors.forename: Dong-Chan
authors.initials: DC
authors.lastname: Oh
authors.forename: Michael
authors.initials: M
authors.lastname: Poulsen
mesh_terms: D000818:Animals; D001407:Bacillus / Q000737:chemistry / Q000145:classification / Q000235:genetics*; D020049:Isoptera / Q000382:microbiology*; D005810:Multigene Family; D010802:Phylogeny; D011090:Polyenes / Q000737:chemistry* / Q000302:isolation & purification / Q000494:pharmacology; D017422:Sequence Analysis, DNA; D013559:Symbiosis; D055434:Termitomyces / Q000187:drug effects
chemical_list: D011090:Polyenes; C096634:bacillaene