1. Paenibacillus polymyxa Associated with the Stingless Bee Melipona scutellaris Produces Antimicrobial Compounds against Entomopathogens
- Author
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Mônica Tallarico Pupo, Carla Menegatti, Fabio S. Nascimento, Daniel Blascke Carrão, Weilan G. P. Melo, Anderson Rodrigo Moraes de Oliveira, and Norberto Peporine Lopes
- Subjects
0301 basic medicine ,Stingless bee ,030106 microbiology ,Biochemistry ,Microbiology ,03 medical and health sciences ,Anti-Infective Agents ,Symbiosis ,Disk Diffusion Antimicrobial Tests ,LACTATOS ,Depsipeptides ,RNA, Ribosomal, 16S ,Animals ,Melipona scutellaris ,Phylogeny ,Ecology, Evolution, Behavior and Systematics ,Larva ,biology ,Microbiota ,fungi ,Fungi ,Sequence Analysis, DNA ,General Medicine ,Bees ,Antimicrobial ,biology.organism_classification ,Chemical ecology ,030104 developmental biology ,Spectrometry, Mass, Matrix-Assisted Laser Desorption-Ionization ,Lactates ,Paenibacillus polymyxa ,Bacteria - Abstract
Social insects are frequently observed in symbiotic association with bacteria that produce antimicrobial natural products as a defense mechanism. There is a lack of studies on the microbiota associated with stingless bees and their antimicrobial compounds. To the best of our knowledge, this study is the first to report the isolation of Paenibacillus polymyxa ALLI-03-01 from the larval food of the stingless bee Melipona scutellaris. The bacterial strain was cultured under different conditions and produced (L)-(-)-3-phenyllactic acid and fusaricidins, which were active against entomopathogenic fungi and Paenibacillus larvae. Our results indicate that such natural products could be related to colony protection, suggesting a defense symbiosis between P. polymyxa ALLI-03-01 and Melipona scutellaris.
- Published
- 2018