title: In silico prediction of a neuropeptidome for the eusocial insect Mastotermes darwiniensis.
abstract: Mastotermes darwiniensis is the most basal living member of the Isoptera (termites), yet it exhibits an extremely advanced level of eusocial organization. Given the interest in, and the high levels of differential developmental and behavioral control needed for, eusociality, it is surprising that essentially nothing is known about the native peptides of M. darwiniensis, which undoubtedly represent the largest and most diverse class of hormones present in this species. The recent public deposition of a 100,000(+)-sequence transcriptome for M. darwiniensis provides a means for peptide discovery in this termite. Here, this resource was mined for putative peptide-encoding transcripts via the BLAST algorithm tblastn and known arthropod neuropeptide precursor queries; mature peptide structures were predicted from the deduced pre/preprohormones using a well-vetted bioinformatics workflow. Thirty-four M. darwiniensis peptide-encoding transcripts were identified, with 163 distinct mature peptides predicted from these sequences. These peptides included members of the adipokinetic hormone, adipokinetic hormone-corazonin-like peptide, allatostatin A, allatostatin C, allatotropin, bursicon β, CCHamide, corazonin, crustacean cardioactive peptide, crustacean hyperglycemic hormone/ion transport peptide, diuretic hormone 31, diuretic hormone 44, FMRFamide-like peptide, insulin-like peptide, leucokinin, myosuppressin, neuroparsin, neuropeptide F, orcokinin, pigment dispersing hormone, pyrokinin, RYamide, short neuropeptide F, SIFamide, sulfakinin and tachykinin-related peptide families. This peptidome is the largest thus far predicted for any member of the Isoptera, and provides a foundation for initiating studies of peptidergic signaling in this and other termites, including ones directed at understanding the roles peptide hormones play in the developmental and behavioral control required for eusociality.
authors.affiliation: Békésy Laboratory of Neurobiology, Pacific Biosciences Research Center, University of Hawaii at Manoa, 1993 East-West Road, Honolulu, HI 96822, USA. Electronic address: crabman@pbrc.hawaii.edu.
authors.forename: Andrew E
authors.initials: AE
authors.lastname: Christie
mesh_terms: D000595:Amino Acid Sequence; D000818:Animals; D019295:Computational Biology / Q000379:methods*; D003198:Computer Simulation; D020049:Isoptera / Q000145:classification / Q000235:genetics / Q000378:metabolism*; D008969:Molecular Sequence Data; D009479:Neuropeptides / Q000032:analysis*; D010802:Phylogeny; D020543:Proteome / Q000032:analysis*; D059467:Transcriptome
chemical_list: D009479:Neuropeptides; D020543:Proteome
keywords: Bioinformatics; Isoptera; Neurohormone; Neuropeptide; Termite; Transcriptome shotgun assembly