Arsenophonus, an emerging clade of intracellular symbionts with a broad host distribution (2009)
Nováková, Eva, Hypša, Václav, Moran, Nancy A
Abstract Background The genus Arsenophonus is a group of symbiotic, mainly insect-associated bacteria with rapidly increasing number of records. It is known from a broad spectrum of hosts and...
The consequences of genetic drift for bacterial genome complexity (2009)
Kuo, Chih-Horng, Moran, Nancy A., Ochman, Howard
Genetic drift, which is particularly effective within small populations, can shape the size and complexity of genomes by affecting the fixation of deleterious mutations. In Bacteria, assessing the...
Aphid Thermal Tolerance Is Governed by a Point Mutation in Bacterial Symbionts (2007)
Helen E. Dunbar, Nicole R. Ferguson, Nancy A. Moran
Symbiosis is a ubiquitous phenomenon generating biological complexity, affecting adaptation, and expanding ecological capabilities. However, symbionts, which can be subject to genetic limitations...
Metabolic complementarity and genomics of the dual bacterial symbiosis of sharpshooters (2006)
Wu, Dongying, Daugherty, Sean C, Van Aken, Susan E, Pai, Grace H, Watkins, Kisha L, Khouri, Hoda, ...
Mutualistic intracellular symbiosis between bacteria and insects is a widespread phenomenon that has contributed to the global success of insects. The symbionts, by provisioning nutrients lacking...
Metabolic Complementarity and Genomics of the Dual Bacterial Symbiosis of Sharpshooters (2006)
Dongying Wu, Sean C. Daugherty, Grace H. Pai, Kisha L. Watkins, Hoda Khouri, ...
Sequence data from two obligate bacterial endosymbionts of an insect--the glassy-winged sharpshooter--suggest there is metabolic co-dependency among them and their insect host.
Metabolic Complementarity and Genomics of the Dual Bacterial Symbiosis of Sharpshooters (2006)
Dongying Wu, Sean C. Daugherty, Grace H. Pai, Kisha L. Watkins, Hoda Khouri, ...
Mutualistic intracellular symbiosis between bacteria and insects is a widespread phenomenon that has contributed to the global success of insects. The symbionts, by provisioning nutrients lacking...
Wilson, Alex CC, Dunbar, Helen E, Davis, Gregory K, Hunter, Wayne B, Stern, David L, Moran, Nancy A
Abstract Background The best studied insect-symbiont system is that of aphids and their primary bacterial endosymbiont Buchnera aphidicola . Buchnera inhabits specialized host cells called...
Evolutionary Origins of Genomic Repertoires in Bacteria (2005)
Emmanuelle Lerat, Vincent Daubin, Howard Ochman, Nancy A. Moran
Lateral gene transfer, rather than duplication, is responsible for most gene diversity present in gamma-Protobacteria; however, these genes are then vertically transmitted and have little impact on...
Evolutionary Origins of Genomic Repertoires in Bacteria (2005)
Emmanuelle Lerat, Vincent Daubin, Howard Ochman, Nancy A. Moran
Explaining the diversity of gene repertoires has been a major problem in modern evolutionary biology. In eukaryotes, this diversity is believed to result mainly from gene duplication and loss, but in...
The Evolutionary History of Quorum-Sensing Systems in Bacteria (2004)
Lerat, Emmanuelle, Moran, Nancy A.
Communication among bacterial cells through quorum-sensing (QS) systems is used to regulate ecologically and medically important traits, including virulence to hosts. QS is widespread in bacteria: it...
The Evolutionary History of Quorum-Sensing Systems in Bacteria (2004)
Lerat, Emmanuelle, Moran, Nancy A.
Communication among bacterial cells through quorum-sensing (QS) systems is used to regulate ecologically and medically important traits, including virulence to hosts. QS is widespread in bacteria; it...
The Evolutionary History of Quorum-Sensing Systems in Bacteria (2004)
Lerat, Emmanuelle, Moran, Nancy A.
Communication among bacterial cells through quorum-sensing (QS) systems is used to regulate ecologically and medically important traits, including virulence to hosts. QS is widespread in bacteria: it...
From Gene Trees to Organismal Phylogeny in Prokaryotes:The Case of the γ-Proteobacteria (2003)
Emmanuelle Lerat, Vincent Daubin, Nancy A. Moran
The study demonstrates that single-copy orthologous genes are resistant to horizontal transfer and can be used to generate robust hypotheses for organismal phylogenies.
From Gene Trees to Organismal Phylogeny in Prokaryotes:The Case of the γ-Proteobacteria (2003)
Emmanuelle Lerat, Vincent Daubin, Nancy A. Moran
The rapid increase in published genomic sequences for bacteria presents the first opportunity to reconstruct evolutionary events on the scale of entire genomes. However, extensive lateral gene...
The process of genome shrinkage in the obligate symbiont Buchnera aphidicola (2001)
Abstract Background Very small genomes have evolved repeatedly in eubacterial lineages that have adopted obligate associations with eukaryotic hosts. Complete genome sequences have revealed that...
Vertical transmission of biosynthetic plasmids in aphid endosymbionts (Buchnera) (2001)
Wernegreen, Jennifer J., Moran, Nancy A.
Author Posting. © American Society for Microbiology, 2001. This article is posted here by permission of American Society for Microbiology for personal use, not for redistribution. The definitive...
Vertical transmission of biosynthetic plasmids in aphid endosymbionts (Buchnera) (2001)
Wernegreen, Jennifer J., Moran, Nancy A.
Author Posting. © American Society for Microbiology, 2001. This article is posted here by permission of American Society for Microbiology for personal use, not for redistribution. The definitive...
Decoupling of genome size and sequence divergence in a symbiotic bacterium (2000)
Wernegreen, Jennifer J., Ochman, Howard, Jones, Isaac B., Moran, Nancy A.
Author Posting. © American Society for Microbiology, 2000. This article is posted here by permission of American Society for Microbiology for personal use, not for redistribution. The definitive...
Decoupling of genome size and sequence divergence in a symbiotic bacterium (2000)
Wernegreen, Jennifer J., Ochman, Howard, Jones, Isaac B., Moran, Nancy A.
Author Posting. © American Society for Microbiology, 2000. This article is posted here by permission of American Society for Microbiology for personal use, not for redistribution. The definitive...
Marta A. Clark, Nancy A. Moran, Paul Baumann, Jennifer J. Wernegreen
Previous studies of phylogenetic congruence between aphids and their symbiotic bacteria (Buchnera) supported long-term vertical transmission of symbionts. However, those studies were based on...
Deleterious mutations destabilize ribosomal RNA in endosymbiotic bacteria
Lambert, J. David, Moran, Nancy A.
In populations that are small and asexual, mutations with slight negative effects on fitness will drift to fixation more often than in large or sexual populations in which they will be eliminated by...
Calibrating bacterial evolution
Ochman, Howard, Elwyn, Susannah, Moran, Nancy A.
Attempts to calibrate bacterial evolution have relied on the assumption that rates of molecular sequence divergence in bacteria are similar to those of higher eukaryotes, or to those of the few...
Genetic conflict and conditional altruism in social aphid colonies
Abbot, Patrick, Withgott, James H., Moran, Nancy A.
Although kin selection is central to the modern study of social evolution, recent studies of social species have revealed that no simple relationship exists between levels of kinship and sociality....
Cospeciation of Psyllids and Their Primary Prokaryotic Endosymbionts
Thao, MyLo L., Moran, Nancy A., Abbot, Patrick, Brennan, Eric B., Burckhardt, Daniel H., Baumann, Paul
Psyllids are plant sap-feeding insects that harbor prokaryotic endosymbionts in specialized cells within the body cavity. Four-kilobase DNA fragments containing 16S and 23S ribosomal DNA (rDNA) were...
Decoupling of Genome Size and Sequence Divergence in a Symbiotic Bacterium
Wernegreen, Jennifer J., Ochman, Howard, Jones, Isaac B., Moran, Nancy A.
In contrast to genome size variation in most bacterial taxa, the small genome size of Buchnera sp. was shown to be highly conserved across genetically diverse isolates (630 to 643 kb). This...
Vertical Transmission of Biosynthetic Plasmids in Aphid Endosymbionts (Buchnera)
Wernegreen, Jennifer J., Moran, Nancy A.
This study tested for horizontal transfer of plasmids among Buchnera aphidicola strains associated with ecologically and phylogenetically related aphid hosts (Uroleucon species). Phylogenetic...
Degenerative Minimalism in the Genome of a Psyllid Endosymbiont
Clark, Marta A., Baumann, Linda, Thao, MyLo Ly, Moran, Nancy A., Baumann, Paul
Psyllids, like aphids, feed on plant phloem sap and are obligately associated with prokaryotic endosymbionts acquired through vertical transmission from an ancestral infection. We have sequenced 37...
Type III secretion systems and the evolution of mutualistic endosymbiosis
Dale, Colin, Plague, Gordon R., Wang, Ben, Ochman, Howard, Moran, Nancy A.
The view that parasites can develop cooperative symbiotic relationships with their hosts is both appealing and widely held; however, there is no molecular genetic evidence of such a transition. Here...
Facultative bacterial symbionts in aphids confer resistance to parasitic wasps
Oliver, Kerry M., Russell, Jacob A., Moran, Nancy A., Hunter, Martha S.
Symbiotic relationships between animals and microorganisms are common in nature, yet the factors controlling the abundance and distributions of symbionts are mostly unknown. Aphids have an obligate...
From Gene Trees to Organismal Phylogeny in Prokaryotes:The Case of the γ-Proteobacteria
Lerat, Emmanuelle, Daubin, Vincent, Moran, Nancy A
The rapid increase in published genomic sequences for bacteria presents the first opportunity to reconstruct evolutionary events on the scale of entire genomes. However, extensive lateral gene...
A genomic perspective on nutrient provisioning by bacterial symbionts of insects
Moran, Nancy A., Plague, Gordon R., Sandström, Jonas P., Wilcox, Jennifer L.
Many animals show intimate interactions with bacterial symbionts that provision hosts with limiting nutrients. The best studied such association is that between aphids and Buchnera aphidicola, which...
Evolutionary Origins of Genomic Repertoires in Bacteria
Lerat, Emmanuelle, Daubin, Vincent, Ochman, Howard, Moran, Nancy A
Explaining the diversity of gene repertoires has been a major problem in modern evolutionary biology. In eukaryotes, this diversity is believed to result mainly from gene duplication and loss, but in...
Moran, Nancy A., Russell, Jacob A., Koga, Ryuichi, Fukatsu, Takema
Ecological studies on three bacterial lineages symbiotic in aphids have shown that they impose a variety of effects on their hosts, including resistance to parasitoids and tolerance to heat stress....
Variation in resistance to parasitism in aphids is due to symbionts not host genotype
Oliver, Kerry M., Moran, Nancy A., Hunter, Martha S.
Natural enemies are important ecological and evolutionary forces, and heritable variation in resistance to enemies is a prerequisite for adaptive responses of populations. Such variation in...
Dale, Colin, Dunbar, Helen, Moran, Nancy A., Ochman, Howard
Analysis of many bacterial genomes is impeded by the inability to separate individual species from complex mixtures of cells or to propagate cells in pure culture. This problem is an obstacle to the...
Horizontal Transfer of Bacterial Symbionts: Heritability and Fitness Effects in a Novel Aphid Host
Russell, Jacob A., Moran, Nancy A.
Members of several bacterial lineages are known only as symbionts of insects and move among hosts through maternal transmission. Such vertical transfer promotes strong fidelity within these...
Moran, Nancy A., Tran, Phat, Gerardo, Nicole M.
Several insect groups have obligate, vertically transmitted bacterial symbionts that provision hosts with nutrients that are limiting in the diet. Some of these bacteria have been shown to descend...
Moran, Nancy A., Dunbar, Helen E., Wilcox, Jennifer L.
Buchnera aphidicola, the obligate symbiont of aphids, has an extremely reduced genome, of which about 10% is devoted to the biosynthesis of essential amino acids needed by its hosts. Most regulatory...
The players in a mutualistic symbiosis: Insects, bacteria, viruses, and virulence genes
Moran, Nancy A., Degnan, Patrick H., Santos, Scott R., Dunbar, Helen E., Ochman, Howard
Aphids maintain mutualistic symbioses involving consortia of coinherited organisms. All possess a primary endosymbiont, Buchnera, which compensates for dietary deficiencies; many also contain...
Metabolic Complementarity and Genomics of the Dual Bacterial Symbiosis of Sharpshooters
Wu, Dongying, Daugherty, Sean C, Van Aken, Susan E, Pai, Grace H, Watkins, Kisha L, Khouri, Hoda, ...
Mutualistic intracellular symbiosis between bacteria and insects is a widespread phenomenon that has contributed to the global success of insects. The symbionts, by provisioning nutrients lacking...
Heritable Endosymbionts of Drosophila
Mateos, Mariana, Castrezana, Sergio J., Nankivell, Becky J., Estes, Anne M., Markow, Therese A., Moran, Nancy A.
Although heritable microorganisms are increasingly recognized as widespread in insects, no systematic screens for such symbionts have been conducted in Drosophila species (the primary insect genetic...
Deleterious mutations destabilize ribosomal RNA in endosymbiotic bacteria
Lambert, J. David, Moran, Nancy A.
In populations that are small and asexual, mutations with slight negative effects on fitness will drift to fixation more often than in large or sexual populations in which they will be eliminated by...
Calibrating bacterial evolution
Ochman, Howard, Elwyn, Susannah, Moran, Nancy A.
Attempts to calibrate bacterial evolution have relied on the assumption that rates of molecular sequence divergence in bacteria are similar to those of higher eukaryotes, or to those of the few...
Genetic conflict and conditional altruism in social aphid colonies
Abbot, Patrick, Withgott, James H., Moran, Nancy A.
Although kin selection is central to the modern study of social evolution, recent studies of social species have revealed that no simple relationship exists between levels of kinship and sociality....
Cospeciation of Psyllids and Their Primary Prokaryotic Endosymbionts
Thao, MyLo L., Moran, Nancy A., Abbot, Patrick, Brennan, Eric B., Burckhardt, Daniel H., Baumann, Paul
Psyllids are plant sap-feeding insects that harbor prokaryotic endosymbionts in specialized cells within the body cavity. Four-kilobase DNA fragments containing 16S and 23S ribosomal DNA (rDNA) were...
Decoupling of Genome Size and Sequence Divergence in a Symbiotic Bacterium
Wernegreen, Jennifer J., Ochman, Howard, Jones, Isaac B., Moran, Nancy A.
In contrast to genome size variation in most bacterial taxa, the small genome size of Buchnera sp. was shown to be highly conserved across genetically diverse isolates (630 to 643 kb). This...
Vertical Transmission of Biosynthetic Plasmids in Aphid Endosymbionts (Buchnera)
Wernegreen, Jennifer J., Moran, Nancy A.
This study tested for horizontal transfer of plasmids among Buchnera aphidicola strains associated with ecologically and phylogenetically related aphid hosts (Uroleucon species). Phylogenetic...
Degenerative Minimalism in the Genome of a Psyllid Endosymbiont
Clark, Marta A., Baumann, Linda, Thao, MyLo Ly, Moran, Nancy A., Baumann, Paul
Psyllids, like aphids, feed on plant phloem sap and are obligately associated with prokaryotic endosymbionts acquired through vertical transmission from an ancestral infection. We have sequenced 37...
Type III secretion systems and the evolution of mutualistic endosymbiosis
Dale, Colin, Plague, Gordon R., Wang, Ben, Ochman, Howard, Moran, Nancy A.
The view that parasites can develop cooperative symbiotic relationships with their hosts is both appealing and widely held; however, there is no molecular genetic evidence of such a transition. Here...
Facultative bacterial symbionts in aphids confer resistance to parasitic wasps
Oliver, Kerry M., Russell, Jacob A., Moran, Nancy A., Hunter, Martha S.
Symbiotic relationships between animals and microorganisms are common in nature, yet the factors controlling the abundance and distributions of symbionts are mostly unknown. Aphids have an obligate...
From Gene Trees to Organismal Phylogeny in Prokaryotes:The Case of the γ-Proteobacteria
Lerat, Emmanuelle, Daubin, Vincent, Moran, Nancy A
The rapid increase in published genomic sequences for bacteria presents the first opportunity to reconstruct evolutionary events on the scale of entire genomes. However, extensive lateral gene...
A genomic perspective on nutrient provisioning by bacterial symbionts of insects
Moran, Nancy A., Plague, Gordon R., Sandström, Jonas P., Wilcox, Jennifer L.
Many animals show intimate interactions with bacterial symbionts that provision hosts with limiting nutrients. The best studied such association is that between aphids and Buchnera aphidicola, which...
Evolutionary Origins of Genomic Repertoires in Bacteria
Lerat, Emmanuelle, Daubin, Vincent, Ochman, Howard, Moran, Nancy A
Explaining the diversity of gene repertoires has been a major problem in modern evolutionary biology. In eukaryotes, this diversity is believed to result mainly from gene duplication and loss, but in...
Moran, Nancy A., Dunbar, Helen E., Wilcox, Jennifer L.
Buchnera aphidicola, the obligate symbiont of aphids, has an extremely reduced genome, of which about 10% is devoted to the biosynthesis of essential amino acids needed by its hosts. Most regulatory...
Moran, Nancy A., Russell, Jacob A., Koga, Ryuichi, Fukatsu, Takema
Ecological studies on three bacterial lineages symbiotic in aphids have shown that they impose a variety of effects on their hosts, including resistance to parasitoids and tolerance to heat stress....
Variation in resistance to parasitism in aphids is due to symbionts not host genotype
Oliver, Kerry M., Moran, Nancy A., Hunter, Martha S.
Natural enemies are important ecological and evolutionary forces, and heritable variation in resistance to enemies is a prerequisite for adaptive responses of populations. Such variation in...
Dale, Colin, Dunbar, Helen, Moran, Nancy A., Ochman, Howard
Analysis of many bacterial genomes is impeded by the inability to separate individual species from complex mixtures of cells or to propagate cells in pure culture. This problem is an obstacle to the...
The players in a mutualistic symbiosis: Insects, bacteria, viruses, and virulence genes
Moran, Nancy A., Degnan, Patrick H., Santos, Scott R., Dunbar, Helen E., Ochman, Howard
Aphids maintain mutualistic symbioses involving consortia of coinherited organisms. All possess a primary endosymbiont, Buchnera, which compensates for dietary deficiencies; many also contain...
Horizontal Transfer of Bacterial Symbionts: Heritability and Fitness Effects in a Novel Aphid Host
Russell, Jacob A., Moran, Nancy A.
Members of several bacterial lineages are known only as symbionts of insects and move among hosts through maternal transmission. Such vertical transfer promotes strong fidelity within these...
Moran, Nancy A., Tran, Phat, Gerardo, Nicole M.
Several insect groups have obligate, vertically transmitted bacterial symbionts that provision hosts with nutrients that are limiting in the diet. Some of these bacteria have been shown to descend...
Metabolic Complementarity and Genomics of the Dual Bacterial Symbiosis of Sharpshooters
Wu, Dongying, Daugherty, Sean C, Van Aken, Susan E, Pai, Grace H, Watkins, Kisha L, Khouri, Hoda, ...
Mutualistic intracellular symbiosis between bacteria and insects is a widespread phenomenon that has contributed to the global success of insects. The symbionts, by provisioning nutrients lacking...
Heritable Endosymbionts of Drosophila
Mateos, Mariana, Castrezana, Sergio J., Nankivell, Becky J., Estes, Anne M., Markow, Therese A., Moran, Nancy A.
Although heritable microorganisms are increasingly recognized as widespread in insects, no systematic screens for such symbionts have been conducted in Drosophila species (the primary insect genetic...
Sexual acquisition of beneficial symbionts in aphids
Moran, Nancy A., Dunbar, Helen E.
A noted cost of mating is the risk of acquiring sexually transmitted infections that are detrimental to the recipient. But many microbial associates of eukaryotes are mutualistic, raising the...
Aphid Thermal Tolerance Is Governed by a Point Mutation in Bacterial Symbionts
Dunbar, Helen E, Wilson, Alex C. C, Ferguson, Nicole R, Moran, Nancy A
Symbiosis is a ubiquitous phenomenon generating biological complexity, affecting adaptation, and expanding ecological capabilities. However, symbionts, which can be subject to genetic limitations...
Russell, Jacob A, Moran, Nancy A
Symbiosis is prevalent throughout the tree of life and has had a significant impact on the ecology and evolution of many bacteria and eukaryotes. The benevolence of symbiotic interactions often...
Costs and benefits of a superinfection of facultative symbionts in aphids
Oliver, Kerry M, Moran, Nancy A, Hunter, Martha S
Symbiotic associations between animals and inherited micro-organisms are widespread in nature. In many cases, hosts may be superinfected with multiple inherited symbionts. Acyrthosiphon pisum (the...
Symbiosis as an adaptive process and source of phenotypic complexity
Genomics has revealed that inheritance systems of separate species are often not well segregated: genes and capabilities that evolve in one lineage are often stably acquired by another lineage....
Extensive Proliferation of Transposable Elements in Heritable Bacterial Symbionts▿ †
Plague, Gordon R., Dunbar, Helen E., Tran, Phat L., Moran, Nancy A.
We found that insertion sequence (IS) elements are unusually abundant in the relatively recently evolved bacterial endosymbionts of maize weevils. Because multicopy elements can facilitate genomic...
Parallel genomic evolution and metabolic interdependence in an ancient symbiosis
McCutcheon, John P., Moran, Nancy A.
Obligate symbioses with nutrient-provisioning bacteria have originated often during animal evolution and have been key to the ecological diversification of many invertebrate groups. To date, genome...
Population dynamics of defensive symbionts in aphids
Oliver, Kerry M, Campos, Jaime, Moran, Nancy A, Hunter, Martha S
Vertically transmitted micro-organisms can increase in frequency in host populations by providing net benefits to hosts. While laboratory studies have identified diverse beneficial effects conferred...
Diverse Phage-Encoded Toxins in a Protective Insect Endosymbiont ▿ †
Degnan, Patrick H., Moran, Nancy A.
The lysogenic bacteriophage APSE infects “Candidatus Hamiltonella defensa,” a facultative endosymbiont of aphids and other sap-feeding insects. This endosymbiont has established a beneficial...
Variable Incidence of Spiroplasma Infections in Natural Populations of Drosophila Species
Watts, Thomas, Haselkorn, Tamara S., Moran, Nancy A., Markow, Therese A.
Spiroplasma is widespread as a heritable bacterial symbiont in insects and some other invertebrates, in which it sometimes acts as a male-killer and causes female-biased sex ratios in hosts. Besides...
McCutcheon, John P., McDonald, Bradon R., Moran, Nancy A.
The genetic code relates nucleotide sequence to amino acid sequence and is shared across all organisms, with the rare exceptions of lineages in which one or a few codons have acquired novel...