The involvement of the microbiota in insect physiology: focus on B vitamins

Javier Serrato-Salas (1) , Mathilde Gendrin (1, 2)

1 Microbiota of Insect Vectors Group
2 Département Parasites et Insectes vecteurs - Department of Parasites and Insect Vectors

Insects are highly successful in colonizing a wide spectrum of ecological niches and in feeding on a wide diversity of diets. This is notably linked to their capacity to get from their microbiota any essential component lacking in the diet such as vitamins and amino acids. Over one century of research based on dietary analysis, antimicrobial treatment, gnotobiotic rearing, culture-independent microbe detection progressively gathered detailed information on the implication of the microbiota in specific aspects of insect fitness. Thanks to the recent increase in sequencing capacities, whole-genome sequencing of a number of symbionts allowed to trace biosynthesis pathways and thus to validate experimental data and to assess their evolution. This field of research generated a considerable set of data in a diversity of hosts harboring specific symbionts or non-specific microbiota members. Here, we review the current knowledge on the involvement of the microbiota in insect and tick nutrition, with a particular focus on B vitamin provision. We notably question if there is any specificity of B vitamin provision by symbionts compared to the redundant yet essential contribution of non-specific microbes. We successively highlight the known aspects of microbial vitamin provision during three main life stages of invertebrates, post-embryonic development, adulthood and reproduction.

Domaines: Zoologie des invertébrés; Microbiologie et Parasitologie; Alimentation et Nutrition; Biologie du développement; Biologie de la reproduction

Javier Serrato-Salas, Mathilde Gendrin. The involvement of the microbiota in insect physiology: focus on B vitamins. 2022. ⟨pasteur-03960648v1⟩