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THE MITOCHONDRIAL GENOME OF THE LEAF-CUTTER ANT ATTA LAEVIGATA: A MITOGENOME WITH A LARGE NUMBER OF INTERGENIC SPACERS
Affilliation
Universidade Estadual Paulista (UNESP). Centro de Estudos de Insetos Sociais. Rio Claro, SP, Brasil / Fundação Oswaldo Cruz. Instituto Oswaldo Cruz. Rio de Janeiro, RJ, Brasil.
Universidade Estadual Paulista (UNESP). Departamento de Zoologia. Rio Claro, SP, Brasil.
Universidade Estadual Paulista (UNESP). Centro de Estudos de Insetos Sociais. Rio Claro, SP, Brasil.
Universidade Estadual Paulista (UNESP). Centro de Estudos de Insetos Sociais. Departamento de Bioquímica e Microbiologia. Rio Claro, SP, Brasil /
Universidade Estadual Paulista (UNESP). Departamento de Zoologia. Rio Claro, SP, Brasil.
Universidade Estadual Paulista (UNESP). Centro de Estudos de Insetos Sociais. Rio Claro, SP, Brasil.
Universidade Estadual Paulista (UNESP). Centro de Estudos de Insetos Sociais. Departamento de Bioquímica e Microbiologia. Rio Claro, SP, Brasil /
Abstract
In this paper we describe the nearly complete mitochondrial genome of the leaf-cutter ant Atta laevigata, assembled using
transcriptomic libraries from Sanger and Illumina next generation sequencing (NGS), and PCR products. This mitogenome
was found to be very large (18,729 bp), given the presence of 30 non-coding intergenic spacers (IGS) spanning 3,808 bp. A
portion of the putative control region remained unsequenced. The gene content and organization correspond to that
inferred for the ancestral pancrustacea, except for two tRNA gene rearrangements that have been described previously in
other ants. The IGS were highly variable in length and dispersed through the mitogenome. This pattern was also found for
the other hymenopterans in particular for the monophyletic Apocrita. These spacers with unknown function may be
valuable for characterizing genome evolution and distinguishing closely related species and individuals. NGS provided
better coverage than Sanger sequencing, especially for tRNA and ribosomal subunit genes, thus facilitating efforts to fill in
sequence gaps. The results obtained showed that data from transcriptomic libraries contain valuable information for
assembling mitogenomes. The present data also provide a source of molecular markers that will be very important for
improving our understanding of genomic evolutionary processes and phylogenetic relationships among hymenopterans.
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