Portal de Periódicos da CAPES

Artigo Acesso aberto Produção Nacional Revisado por pares

BIBTEX RIS

Microsatellite Marker Discovery in the Stingless Bee Uruçu-Amarela (Melipona rufiventris Group, Hymenoptera, Meliponini) for Population Genetic Analysis

2019; Multidisciplinary Digital Publishing Institute; Volume: 10; Issue: 12 Linguagem: Inglês

10.3390/insects10120450

2075-4450

Aline Barbosa Negreiros, Geice Ribeiro da Silva, Francisca Andréa Silva Oliveira, Helder Canto Resende, Tânia M. Fernandes-Salomão, Rodrigo Maggioni, F. de M. Pereira, Bruno de Almeida Souza, Maria T. R. Lopes, Fábio Mendonça Diniz,

Insect and Arachnid Ecology and Behavior

The species Melipona rufiventris Lepeletier, 1836 is a Brazilian native stingless bee that is part of a species complex known as the 'rufiventris group', making it difficult to distinguish between the different species. Populations in this group are facing a severe decline, leading to the risk of local extinction, and therefore, their conservation should be treated as a major concern. This study describes the first set of tri- and tetranucleotide microsatellite markers, using next-generation sequencing technology for use in the identification of genetic diversity and population structure in the 'rufiventris group'. A total of 16 microsatellite loci displayed polymorphism. Analysis of the whole data set (n = 50) detected 63 alleles in all loci, ranging from 2 to 7 with a mean of 3.9 alleles/locus. A genetic diversity analysis revealed high values for population differentiation estimates (FST = 0.252, RST = 0.317, and DEST = 0.284) between the Atlantic Forest, Cerrado, and Caatinga biomes. An additional evidence for genetic divergence among populations was also found in the 'rufiventris group'; these should be treated as separate conservation units or even as separate species. These microsatellite markers have demonstrated a strong potential for assessing population discrimination in this threatened stingless bee group.