Abstract
The Malaysian stingless bee industry is hugely dependent on wild colonies. Nevertheless, the availability of new queens to establish new colonies is insufficient to meet the growing demand for hives in the industry. Heterotrigona itama is primarily utilized for honey production in the region and the major source of stingless bee colonies comes from the wild. To propagate new colonies domestically, a fundamental understanding of the biology of queen development, especially from the genomics aspect, is necessary. The whole genome was sequenced using a paired-end 150 strategy on the Illumina HiSeq X platform. The shotgun sequencing generated approximately 89 million raw pair-end reads with a total output of 13.37 Gb and a GC content of 37.31%. The genome size of the species was estimated to be approximately 272 Mb. Phylogenetic analysis showed H. itama are much more closely related to the bumble bee (Bombus spp.) than they are to the modern honey bee (Apis spp.). The genome data provided here are expected to contribute to a better understanding of the genetic aspect of queen differentiation as well as of important molecular pathways which are crucial for stingless bee biology, management and conservation.
Highlights
Codon Genomics S/B, Jalan Dutamas 7, Taman Dutamas Balakong, Seri Kembangan 43200, Selangor, Agrobiodiversity and Environmental Research Centre, Malaysian Agricultural Research and Development
While some taxa have limited distributions, Heterotrigona itama populations are scattered in Malesia
Based on our recent species diversity survey, Meliponines found in Malaysia produce edible, fragrant kinds of honey, the taste of which is generally sweet-tangy and whose color varies depending on the season
Summary
Malaysia is home to about 50 different species of Meliponines (stingless bees) previously belonging to 13 genera [1]. Tamizi et al [14] conducted a related study focusing on the transcriptomics of a queen larva which discovered that H. itama most highly follows a conserved caste differentiation pathway based on the detection of a few sets of annotated genes related to queen differentiation. We report the genome sequencing, de novo assembly and annotation data of the Malaysian stingless bee, H. itama, which can help researchers to better access genes and pathways related to queen differentiation from a much larger nucleotide reference—the genome. The sequenced H. itama genome is the first report for the Indo-Malayan/Australasian stingless bee group and the fourth in the world after two Neotropical stingless bees, Melipona quadrifasciata and Frieseomelitta varia [15,16], and an Asian species from Taiwan, Lepidotrigona ventralis hoosana (GenBank accession: PRJNA387986), which had been revised as Lepidotrigona hoozana (Strand) Rasmussen [1]
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