English (United Kingdom)

https://curated-unify.zendy.io/wp-json/zendy-region/v1/featured_content/oa?rat=en

https://curated-unify.zendy.io/wp-json/zendy-region/v1/highlighted_journal/

Global: Zendy Plus annual

Presents the access of premium content as premium feature

Premium Content

Presents the keyphrase highlighting as premium feature

Keyphrase Highlighting

Presents the summarisation as premium feature

Summarisation

Insights

Presents the pdf analysis as premium feature

PDF Analysis

Presents the zaia usage as premium feature

ZAIA

Global: Zendy Tools annual

Global: Zendy Free Plan

Global: Zendy Tools monthly

Global: Zendy Plus monthly

Attine ants are dependent on a cultivated fungus for food and use antibiotics produced by symbiotic Actinobacteria as weedkillers in their fungus gardens. Actinobacterial species belonging to the genera  Pseudonocardia, Streptomyces  and  Amycolatopsis  have been isolated from attine ant nests and shown to confer protection against a range of microfungal weeds. In previous work on the higher attine  Acromyrmex octospinosus  we isolated a  Streptomyces  strain that produces candicidin, consistent with another report that attine ants use  Streptomyces -produced candicidin in their fungiculture. Here we report the genome analysis of this  Streptomyces  strain and identify multiple antibiotic biosynthetic pathways. We demonstrate, using gene disruptions and mass spectrometry, that this single strain has the capacity to make candicidin and multiple antimycin compounds. Although antimycins have been known for >60 years we report the sequence of the biosynthetic gene cluster for the first time. Crucially, disrupting the candicidin and antimycin gene clusters in the same strain had no effect on bioactivity against a co-evolved nest pathogen called  Escovopsis  that has been identified in ∼30% of attine ant nests. Since the  Streptomyces  strain has strong bioactivity against  Escovopsis  we conclude that it must make additional antifungal(s) to inhibit  Escovopsis . However, candicidin and antimycins likely offer protection against other microfungal weeds that infect the attine fungal gardens. Thus, we propose that the selection of this biosynthetically prolific strain from the natural environment provides  A. octospinosus  with broad spectrum activity against  Escovopsis  and other microfungal weeds.

A Single Streptomyces Symbiont Makes Multiple Antifungals to Support the Fungus Farming Ant Acromyrmex octospinosus