ORIGINAL RESEARCH article
Front. Insect Sci.
Sec. Insect Health and Pathology
Volume 5 - 2025 | doi: 10.3389/finsc.2025.1614310
This article is part of the Research TopicDiversity of Beetles and Associated Microorganisms, Volume IIView all 6 articles
Comparative analysis of gut symbionts in Tribolium castaneum (Coleoptera: Tenebrionidae) and their dietary substrate, sauce-flavored Daqu
Provisionally accepted
- Moutai College, Renhuai, China
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Tribolium castaneum (red flour beetle), a major pest infesting stored sauce-flavored Daqu (SFD), causes significant economic losses in the sauce-flavored liquor industry. This study analyzed microbial interactions between SFD and T. castaneum (adults and larvae) using 16S rDNA and ITS sequencing. T. castaneum guts primarily hosted Bacteroidota (44.7% adults, 50.9% larvae) and Proteobacteria, contrasting SFD's Firmicutes-dominated community (89.3%), featuring Oceanobacillus (31.7%) and Bacillus (11.2%). Fungal communities across groups were Ascomycota-rich (90%), with Aspergillus (86%) as core, while larvae uniquely harbored Lichtheimia (5.5%). Larvae shared more bacterial taxa with SFD (5 genera vs. 3 in adults), yet high-abundance SFD bacteria (e.g., Weissella) were scarce in guts (0.6%) and vice versa. Fungal source tracking revealed SFD contributed 89-94% of gut fungi, vastly exceeding bacterial inputs (2.8-5%). Shared bacterial ASVs (n=58) exhibited functional divergence: carbohydrate metabolism dominated in SFD, whereas insect-associated ASVs enriched drug resistance genes. Findings suggest T. castaneum selectively colonizes SFD bacteria (e.g., Bacillus, Oceanobacillus) while proportionally acquiring fungi (e.g., Aspergillus) via dietary transmission. These microbes may act as a gut "seed bank" or host-selected symbionts, warranting further validation to clarify their ecological roles and inform microbially-based pest control strategies.
Keywords: sauce-flavored Daqu, Tribolium castaneum, Gut symbionts, 16S rDNA, ITS
Received: 18 Apr 2025; Accepted: 18 Jun 2025.
Copyright: © 2025 Lü, Xu, Teng, Huang, Xiong and Cheng. This is an open-access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (CC BY). The use, distribution or reproduction in other forums is permitted, provided the original author(s) or licensor are credited and that the original publication in this journal is cited, in accordance with accepted academic practice. No use, distribution or reproduction is permitted which does not comply with these terms.
* Correspondence:
Guiqin Xiong, Moutai College, Renhuai, China
Qin Cheng, Moutai College, Renhuai, China
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