Akademik Veri Yönetim Sistemi
Rafıqı A. M., Polo P. G.(Yürütücü)
Yükseköğretim Kurumları Destekli Proje, BAP Araştırma Projesi, 2020 - 2021
Wild and commercial bumble bees are among the most
common and important insect pollinators. World-wide, bumble bee populations are
shrinking. Understanding the factors affecting bumble bee health is vital to
agriculture and to the sustainability of natural ecosystems. Microbiota can
have a major impact on the physiology of the host, and potentially on its
health and behavior. However, the study of endosymbionts within bumble bees has
been limited almost exclusively to bacteria. Still very little is known about
other potential endosymbionts as fungi.
Because bumblebees are sold as pollinators and are
available for purchase nationally and internationally, there is a movement of
bumblebees from one place to another. This leads to a movement of their
associated microbiota and also pathogens. It is known that there are specially
two important bumblebee pathogens: Crithidia bombi and Nosema bombi
that are contributing to decline of Bombus populations.
In this study we will characterize fungal
endosymbionts of bumble bees and we will ascertain their relation with these
two pathogens. For this goal we will use next generation sequencing to identify
of the fungal microbial symbiotic complex associated with bumble bees and quantitative
PCR (qPCR) for studying their relation with prevalence of these two pathogens.
This will help us understand if health and disease can
be associated with certain features of the fungal microbiota. Moreover, this
project will give us new perspectives on the evolutionary processes that shape
symbiotic associations and new potential co-evolutionary interactions between
microbiomes and pathogens.