↓ Skip to main content

Comparative transcriptomic analysis of immune responses of the migratory locust, Locusta migratoria, to challenge by the fungal insect pathogen, Metarhizium acridum

Overview of attention for article published in BMC Genomics, October 2015
Altmetric Badge

About this Attention Score

  • In the top 25% of all research outputs scored by Altmetric
  • Good Attention Score compared to outputs of the same age (78th percentile)
  • High Attention Score compared to outputs of the same age and source (85th percentile)

Mentioned by

twitter
13 X users

Citations

dimensions_citation
54 Dimensions

Readers on

mendeley
69 Mendeley
You are seeing a free-to-access but limited selection of the activity Altmetric has collected about this research output. Click here to find out more.
Title
Comparative transcriptomic analysis of immune responses of the migratory locust, Locusta migratoria, to challenge by the fungal insect pathogen, Metarhizium acridum
Published in
BMC Genomics, October 2015
DOI 10.1186/s12864-015-2089-9
Pubmed ID
Authors

Wei Zhang, Jianhong Chen, Nemat O. Keyhani, Zhengyi Zhang, Sai Li, Yuxian Xia

Abstract

The migratory locust, Locusta migratoria manilensis, is an immensely destructive agricultural pest that forms a devastating and voracious gregarious phase. The fungal insect pathogen, Metarhizium acridum, is a specialized locust pathogen that has been used as a potent mycoinsecticide for locust control. Little, however, is known about locust immune tissue, i.e. fat body and hemocyte, responses to challenge by this fungus. RNA-seq (RNA sequencing) technology were applied to comparatively examine the different roles of locust fat body and hemocytes, the two major contributors to the insect immune response, in defense against M. acridum. According to the sequence identity to homologies of other species explored immune response genes, immune related unigenes were screened in all transcriptome wide range from locust and the differential expressed genes were identified in these two tissues, respectively. Analysis of differentially expressed locust genes revealed 4660 and 138 up-regulated, and 1647 and 23 down-regulated transcripts in the fat body and hemocytes, respectively after inoculation with M. acridum spores. GO (Gene Ontology) enrichment analysis showed membrane biogenesis related proteins and effector proteins significantly differentially expressed in hemocytes, while the expression of energy metabolism and development related transcripts were enriched in the fat body after fungal infection. A total of 470 immune related unigenes were identified, including members of the three major insect immune pathways, i.e. Toll, Imd (immune deficiency) and JAK/STAT (janus kinase/signal transduction and activator of transcription). Of these, 58 and three were differentially expressed in the insect fat body or hemocytes after infection, respectively. Of differential expressed transcripts post challenge, 43 were found in both the fat body and hemocytes, including the LmLys4 lysozyme, representing a microbial cell wall targeting enzyme. These data indicate that locust fat body and hemocytes adopt different strategies in response to M. acridum infection. Fat body gene expression after M. acridum challenge appears to function mainly through activation of innate immune related genes, energy metabolism and development related genes. Hemocyte responses attempt to limit fungal infection primarily through regulation of membrane related genes and activation of cellular immune responses and release of humoral immune factors.

X Demographics

X Demographics

The data shown below were collected from the profiles of 13 X users who shared this research output. Click here to find out more about how the information was compiled.
Mendeley readers

Mendeley readers

The data shown below were compiled from readership statistics for 69 Mendeley readers of this research output. Click here to see the associated Mendeley record.

Geographical breakdown

Country Count As %
Netherlands 1 1%
Unknown 68 99%

Demographic breakdown

Readers by professional status Count As %
Researcher 15 22%
Student > Ph. D. Student 13 19%
Student > Bachelor 10 14%
Student > Master 10 14%
Student > Doctoral Student 4 6%
Other 8 12%
Unknown 9 13%
Readers by discipline Count As %
Agricultural and Biological Sciences 34 49%
Biochemistry, Genetics and Molecular Biology 15 22%
Immunology and Microbiology 2 3%
Environmental Science 1 1%
Veterinary Science and Veterinary Medicine 1 1%
Other 3 4%
Unknown 13 19%
Attention Score in Context

Attention Score in Context

This research output has an Altmetric Attention Score of 7. This is our high-level measure of the quality and quantity of online attention that it has received. This Attention Score, as well as the ranking and number of research outputs shown below, was calculated when the research output was last mentioned on 08 November 2015.
All research outputs
#4,509,784
of 22,831,537 outputs
Outputs from BMC Genomics
#1,874
of 10,655 outputs
Outputs of similar age
#62,387
of 284,375 outputs
Outputs of similar age from BMC Genomics
#57
of 382 outputs
Altmetric has tracked 22,831,537 research outputs across all sources so far. Compared to these this one has done well and is in the 80th percentile: it's in the top 25% of all research outputs ever tracked by Altmetric.
So far Altmetric has tracked 10,655 research outputs from this source. They receive a mean Attention Score of 4.7. This one has done well, scoring higher than 82% of its peers.
Older research outputs will score higher simply because they've had more time to accumulate mentions. To account for age we can compare this Altmetric Attention Score to the 284,375 tracked outputs that were published within six weeks on either side of this one in any source. This one has done well, scoring higher than 78% of its contemporaries.
We're also able to compare this research output to 382 others from the same source and published within six weeks on either side of this one. This one has done well, scoring higher than 85% of its contemporaries.