Carbohydrate metabolism genes and pathways in insects: Insights from the honey bee genome

T. Kunieda, T. Fujiyuki, R. Kucharski, S. Foret, S. A. Ament, A. L. Toth, K. Ohashi, H. Takeuchi, A. Kamikouchi, E. Kage, M. Morioka, M. Beye*, T. Kubo, G. E. Robinson, R. Maleszka

*Corresponding author for this work

    Research output: Contribution to journalArticlepeer-review

    124 Citations (Scopus)

    Abstract

    Carbohydrate-metabolizing enzymes may have particularly interesting roles in the honey bee, Apis mellifera, because this social insect has an extremely carbohydrate-rich diet, and nutrition plays important roles in caste determination and socially mediated behavioural plasticity. We annotated a total of 174 genes encoding carbohydrate-metabolizing enzymes and 28 genes encoding lipid-metabolizing enzymes, based on orthology to their counterparts in the fly, Drosophila melanogaster, and the mosquito, Anopheles gambiae. We found that the number of genes for carbohydrate metabolism appears to be more evolutionarily labile than for lipid metabolism. In particular, we identified striking changes in gene number or genomic organization for genes encoding glycolytic enzymes, cellulase, glucose oxidase and glucose dehydrogenases, glucose-methanol-choline (GMC) oxidoreductases, fucosyltransferases, and lysozymes.

    Original languageEnglish
    Pages (from-to)563-576
    Number of pages14
    JournalInsect Molecular Biology
    Volume15
    Issue number5
    DOIs
    Publication statusPublished - Oct 2006

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