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8 results on '"Bian, Xueni"'

1. Signatures of increasing environmental stress in bumblebee wings over the past century: Insights from museum specimens

Author

Arce, Andres N., primary, Cantwell‐Jones, Aoife, additional, Tansley, Michael, additional, Barnes, Ian, additional, Brace, Selina, additional, Mullin, Victoria E., additional, Notton, David, additional, Ollerton, Jeff, additional, Eatough, Emma, additional, Rhodes, Marcus W., additional, Bian, Xueni, additional, Hogan, James, additional, Hunter, Tony, additional, Jackson, Simon, additional, Whiffin, Ashleigh, additional, Blagoderov, Vladimir, additional, Broad, Gavin, additional, Judd, Steve, additional, Kokkini, Phaedra, additional, Livermore, Laurence, additional, Dixit, Mahika K., additional, Pearse, William D., additional, and Gill, Richard J., additional

Published
2022
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2. The SITE-100 Project: Site-Based Biodiversity Genomics for Species Discovery, Community Ecology, and a Global Tree-of-Life

Author

Bian, Xueni, garner, beulah, Liu, Huaxi, Vogler, Alfried P, Bian, Xueni, garner, beulah, Liu, Huaxi, and Vogler, Alfried P

Abstract

Most insect communities are composed of evolutionarily diverse lineages, but detailed phylogenetic analyses of whole communities are lacking, in particular in species-rich tropical faunas. Likewise, our knowledge of the Tree-of-Life to document evolutionary diversity of organisms remains highly incomplete and especially requires the inclusion of unstudied lineages from species-rich ecosystems. Here we present the SITE-100 program, which is an attempt at building the Tree-of-Life from whole-community sampling of high-biodiversity sites around the globe. Combining the local site-based sets into a global tree produces an increasingly comprehensive estimate of organismal phylogeny, while also re-tracing evolutionary history of lineages constituting the local community. Local sets are collected in bulk in standardized passive traps and imaged with large-scale high-resolution cameras, which is followed by a parataxonomy step for the preliminary separation of morphospecies and selection of specimens for phylogenetic analysis. Selected specimens are used for individual DNA extraction and sequencing, usually to sequence mitochondrial genomes. All remaining specimens are bulk extracted and subjected to metabarcoding. Phylogenetic analysis on the mitogenomes produces a reference tree to which short barcode sequences are added in a secondary analysis using phylogenetic placement methods or backbone constrained tree searches. However, the approach may be hampered because (1) mitogenomes are limited in phylogenetic informativeness, and (2) site-based sampling may produce poor taxon coverage which causes challenges for phylogenetic inference. To mitigate these problems, we first assemble nuclear shotgun data from taxonomically chosen lineages to resolve the base of the tree, and add site-based mitogenome and DNA barcode data in three hierarchical steps. We posit that site-based sampling, though not meeting the criterion of “taxon-completeness,” has great merits given preliminary s

Published
2022

5. Signatures of increasing environmental stress in bumblebee wings over the past century: Insights from museum specimens.

Author

Arce, Andres N., Cantwell‐Jones, Aoife, Tansley, Michael, Barnes, Ian, Brace, Selina, Mullin, Victoria E., Notton, David, Ollerton, Jeff, Eatough, Emma, Rhodes, Marcus W., Bian, Xueni, Hogan, James, Hunter, Tony, Jackson, Simon, Whiffin, Ashleigh, Blagoderov, Vladimir, Broad, Gavin, Judd, Steve, Kokkini, Phaedra, and Livermore, Laurence

Subjects
INSECT pollinators, BUMBLEBEES, ANIMAL populations, ANIMAL population density, WEATHER, TWENTIETH century, CLIMATE change
Abstract

Determining when animal populations have experienced stress in the past is fundamental to understanding how risk factors drive contemporary and future species' responses to environmental change. For insects, quantifying stress and associating it with environmental factors has been challenging due to a paucity of time‐series data and because detectable population‐level responses can show varying lag effects. One solution is to leverage historic entomological specimens to detect morphological proxies of stress experienced at the time stressors emerged, allowing us to more accurately determine population responses.Here we studied specimens of four bumblebee species, an invaluable group of insect pollinators, from five museums collected across Britain over the 20th century. We calculated the degree of fluctuating asymmetry (FA; random deviations from bilateral symmetry) between the right and left forewings as a potential proxy of developmental stress.We: (a) investigated whether baseline FA levels vary between species, and how this compares between the first and second half of the century; (b) determined the extent of FA change over the century in the four bumblebee species, and whether this followed a linear or nonlinear trend; (c) tested which annual climatic conditions correlated with increased FA in bumblebees.Species differed in their baseline FA, with FA being higher in the two species that have recently expanded their ranges in Britain. Overall, FA significantly increased over the century but followed a nonlinear trend, with the increase starting c. 1925. We found relatively warm and wet years were associated with higher FA.Collectively our findings show that FA in bumblebees increased over the 20th century and under weather conditions that will likely increase in frequency with climate change. By plotting FA trends and quantifying the contribution of annual climate conditions on past populations, we provide an important step towards improving our understanding of how environmental factors could impact future populations of wild beneficial insects. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Published
2023
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8. Independent effects on cellular and humoral immune responses underlie genotype-by-genotype interactions between Drosophila and parasitoids

Author

Leitão, Alexandre B, Bian, Xueni, Day, Jonathan P, Pitton, Simone, Demir, Eşref, and Jiggins, Francis M

Subjects
Male, Drosophila melanogaster, Hemocytes, Genotype, Monophenol Monooxygenase, Wasps, Animals, Female, 3. Good health, Host-Parasite Interactions, Immunity, Humoral
Abstract

It is common to find abundant genetic variation in host resistance and parasite infectivity within populations, with the outcome of infection frequently depending on genotype-specific interactions. Underlying these effects are complex immune defenses that are under the control of both host and parasite genes. We have found extensive variation in Drosophila melanogaster's immune response against the parasitoid wasp Leptopilina boulardi. Some aspects of the immune response, such as phenoloxidase activity, are predominantly affected by the host genotype. Some, such as upregulation of the complement-like protein Tep1, are controlled by the parasite genotype. Others, like the differentiation of immune cells called lamellocytes, depend on the specific combination of host and parasite genotypes. These observations illustrate how the outcome of infection depends on independent genetic effects on different aspects of host immunity. As parasite-killing results from the concerted action of different components of the immune response, these observations provide a physiological mechanism to generate phenomena like epistasis and genotype-interactions that underlie models of coevolution.

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