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Aerobic and facultative
anaerobic bacteria from gut of red palm weevil (Rhynchophorus
ferrugineus)
Mohammad Khiyami* and Essam Alyamani
Natural Resources and Environment Research Institute,
Biotechnology and Genetic Engineering Research Center, King
Abdulaziz City for Science and Technology, Riyadh, Saudi
Arabia.
*Corresponding author. E-mail:
Mkhiyami@kacst.edu.sa.
Tel: +966-481-3772. Fax: +9661- 481-3611.
Accepted 11 April, 2008 |
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Red palm weevil (RPW),
Rhynchophorus ferrugineus Oliver is one of the insects
that attack date palm trees directly and cause its death.
This infection poses serious economical consequences in
Saudi Arabia and other gulf countries. RPW assimilates the
components of palm tree tissues. Significant amount of
microbiota in the gut of RPW may contribute to success of
its pathogenesis. This study explored the nature of
microbiota in RPW by culture-dependent and molecular-based
techniques using PCR and sequencing analysis. Larvae of RPW
were fed on an artificial diet and were fixed before opening
its gut for microbial cultivation on enrichment media. Pure
cultures were obtained after incubating the plates at
different atmospheric conditions (aerobic, and strictly
anaerobic). The majority of isolated microbiota observed
were aerobes and facultative anaerobes (Bacillus
sp., Salmonella sp., Enterococcus sp., and
Xanthomonas sp.).
These qualitative differences of bacteria, suggest the
presence of a complex ecosystem in the gut of RPW.
Subsequently, bacterial DNAs were extracted from pure
cultures for definitive molecular identifications. Hot
start-touchdown PCR was performed to amplify regions within
16S rDNA. Amplicons were cloned into the TOPO-TA vector for
sequencing. The data reveal to some extent that aerobic and
facultative anaerobic bacteria are more distributed in the
gut of RPW.
Key words:
16S rDNA, microbiota, red palm weevil, date-palm. |
