Abstract
The social hymenoptera are emerging as models for epigenetics. DNA methylation, the addition of a methyl group, is a common epigenetic marker. In mammals and flowering plants methylation affects allele specific expression. There is contradictory evidence for the role of methylation on allele specific expression in social insects. The aim of this paper is to investigate allele specific expression and monoallelic methylation in the bumblebee, Bombus terrestris. We found nineteen genes that were both monoallelically methylated and monoallelically expressed in a single bee. Fourteen of these genes express the hypermethylated allele, while the other five express the hypomethylated allele. We also searched for allele specific expression in twenty-nine published RNA-seq libraries. We found 555 loci with allele-specific expression. We discuss our results with reference to the functional role of methylation in gene expression in insects and in the as yet unquantified role of genetic cis effects in insect allele specific methylation and expression.
Highlights
Epigenetics is the study of heritable changes in gene expression that do not involve changes to the underlying DNA sequence (Goldberg, Allis & Bernstein, 2007)
Social hymenoptera are important emerging models for epigenetics (Glastad et al, 2011; Weiner & Toth, 2012; Welch & Lister, 2014; Yan et al, 2014). This is due to theoretical predictions for a role for an epigenetic phenomenon, genomic imprinting, in their social organisation (Queller, 2003), the recent discovery of parent-of-origin allele specific expression in honeybees (Galbraith et al, 2016), and data showing a fundamental role in social insect biology for DNA methylation, an epigenetic marker (Chittka, Wurm & Chittka, 2012)
We examined the link between monoallelic methylation and monoallelic expression in the bumblebee, Bombus terrestris using an integrative approached previously used in human epigenetic studies (Harris et al, 2010)
Summary
Epigenetics is the study of heritable changes in gene expression that do not involve changes to the underlying DNA sequence (Goldberg, Allis & Bernstein, 2007). Social hymenoptera (ants, bees, and wasps) are important emerging models for epigenetics (Glastad et al, 2011; Weiner & Toth, 2012; Welch & Lister, 2014; Yan et al, 2014). This is due to theoretical predictions for a role for an epigenetic phenomenon, genomic imprinting (parent of origin allele specific expression), in their social organisation (Queller, 2003), the recent discovery of parent-of-origin allele specific expression in honeybees (Galbraith et al, 2016), and data showing a fundamental role in social insect biology for DNA methylation, an epigenetic marker (Chittka, Wurm & Chittka, 2012). Methylation is associated with allele specific expression in a number of loci in
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