Abstract
Triatoma infestans is the most important Chagas disease vector in South America. Two main evolutionary lineages, named Andean and non-Andean, have been recognized by geographical distribution, phenetic and genetic characteristics. One of the main differences is the genomic size, varying over 30% in their haploid DNA content. Here we realize a genome wide analysis to compare the repetitive genome fraction (repeatome) between both lineages in order to identify the main repetitive DNA changes occurred during T. infestans differentiation process. RepeatExplorer analysis using Illumina reads showed that both lineages exhibit the same amount of non-repeat sequences, and that satellite DNA is by far the major component of repetitive DNA and the main responsible for the genome size differentiation between both lineages. We characterize 42 satellite DNA families, which are virtually all present in both lineages but with different amount in each lineage. Furthermore, chromosomal location of satellite DNA by fluorescence in situ hybridization showed that genomic variations in T. infestans are mainly due to satellite DNA families located on the heterochromatic regions. The results also show that many satDNA families are located on the euchromatic regions of the chromosomes.
Highlights
Triatoma infestans, hemipteran insect of the subfamily Triatominae, is the most important vector of the protozoan Trypanosoma cruzi, the causative agent of Chagas disease
Clusters could be classified into 6 categories or groups: Long Terminal Repeats (LTR), non Long Terminal Repeats, class II elements or DNA transposons (DNA transposable elements (TEs)), satellite DNA, ribosomal DNA and undetermined repeats (Fig 1)
In this last species as well in the pea aphid, the main repetitive fraction consists in transposable elements (TEs) (39% and 38% respectively) unlike the 5–7% observed in T. infestans
Summary
Hemipteran insect of the subfamily Triatominae, is the most important vector of the protozoan Trypanosoma cruzi, the causative agent of Chagas disease. Until 1990s, T. infestans had a wide geographical distribution occupying more than 6 million km in seven South American countries, and was responsible for well over half of the 18 million people affected by Chagas disease [1]. This species included two main evolutionary lineages, named Andean and non-Andean, recognized by genetic [2,3] and phenetic characteristics [4,5]. These lineages present a clearly differentiated geographic distribution.
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