| Title: | A single point mutation causes one-way alteration of pheromone receptor function in two Heliothis species |
| Author(s): | Cao S; Liu Y; Wang B; Wang G; |
| Address: | "State Key Laboratory for Biology of Plant Diseases and Insect Pests, Institute of Plant Protection, Chinese Academy of Agricultural Sciences, Beijing 100193, China. Shenzhen Branch, Guangdong Laboratory for Lingnan Modern Agriculture, Genome Analysis Laboratory of the Ministry of Agriculture and Rural Affairs, Agricultural Genomics Institute at Shenzhen, Chinese Academy of Agricultural Sciences, Shenzhen 518120, China" |
| DOI: | 10.1016/j.isci.2021.102981 |
| ISSN/ISBN: | 2589-0042 (Electronic) 2589-0042 (Linking) |
| Abstract: | "The sex pheromone processing system of moths has been a major focus of research on olfaction and speciation, as it is highly specific and closely related to reproductive isolation. The two noctuid moths Heliothis virescens and Heliothis subflexa have been used as a model for deciphering the mechanisms underlying differentiation in pheromone communication, but no information exist regarding the functions of the pheromone receptors (PRs) of H. subflexa. Here, we functionally characterized all candidate PRs of H. subflexa, and found that only the response profile of OR6 differed between the two species. Through domain swapping and site-directed mutation followed by functional characterization, we identified a critical amino acid in OR6 caused a one-way alteration in specificity. This result suggests HsubOR6 evolved from an ancestral OR6 gene with a HvirOR6-like function and implies that the evolutionary direction of the receptor specificity was from the H. virescens-like pattern to H. subflexa-like pattern" |
| Keywords: | Biological sciences Ecology Neuroscience Sensory neuroscience Zoology; |
| Notes: | "PubMed-not-MEDLINECao, Song Liu, Yang Wang, Bing Wang, Guirong eng 2021/09/07 iScience. 2021 Aug 16; 24(9):102981. doi: 10.1016/j.isci.2021.102981. eCollection 2021 Sep 24" |
