124 Views

Member Symposium

Phenotypic Plasticity in Insects as Experienced Through Art, Science, and Culture

Schistocerca (Orthoptera: Acrididae) as a model clade for studying phenotypic plasticity from a genomic perspective

Sunday, November 13, 2022

4:55 PM – 5:25 PM PT

Location: Vancouver Convention Centre, Meeting Room 110

Presenting Author(s)

Hojun Song

Professor
Texas A&M University
College Station, Texas

Co-Author(s)

Anna K. Childers

Computational Biologist
USDA-ARS
Beltsville, Maryland

Co-author(s)

OD

Olga Dudchenko

Post doctoral scholar
Baylor University
Houston, Texas
SG

Scott M. Geib

Research Entomologist
USDA-ARS
Hilo, Hawai'i
Sheina Biason Sim

Research Biologist
USDA-ARS
Hilo, Hawai'i

Co-Author(s)

TS

Tyler J. Simmonds

USDA-ARS
Hilo, Hawai'i
Amanda Stahlke

Computational Biologist
USDA-ARS
Grand Junction, Colorado

Co-author(s)

Maeva A. Techer (she/her/hers)

Postdoctoral Research Associate
Texas A&M University
College Station, Texas
SR

Stephen Richards

Baylor University
Waco, Texas
EA

Erez Lieberman Aiden

Baylor University
Waco, Texas
FG

Fabrizio Gabbiani

Baylor University
Waco, Texas

The genus Schistocerca (Orthoptera: Acrididae) includes some of the most devastating locust species in the world, including the desert locust (S. gregaria), the Central American locust (S. piceifrons), and the South American locust (S. cancellata). These locust species show an extreme form of density-dependent phenotypic plasticity in which cryptic and shy individuals, known as the solitarious phase, can transform into conspicuous and gregarious individuals, known as the gregarious phase, in response to changes in local population density. In fact, this “locust phase polyphenism” is what makes the locusts distinctly different from regular grasshoppers. Intriguingly, Schistocerca includes 45 species, most of which are non-swarming sedentary grasshopper species, and phylogenetic studies have shown that the locust species do not form a monophyletic group, suggesting that locust phase polyphenism has evolved multiple times in the genus. Furthermore, recent experimental studies have indicated that some of the non-swarming grasshopper species show reduced density-dependent phenotypic plasticity, suggesting that Schistocerca as a whole is an exciting model clade that can be used to study how phenotypic plasticity has evolved as species diverge.

Recently, we launched the Behavioral Plasticity Research Institute (BPRI) supported by the National Science Foundation Biology Integration Institute (NSF-BII) program, which allowed us to produce high-quality chromosome-length assemblies of six Schistocerca species, including three locust and three non-swarming grasshopper species. In this presentation, we introduce these new genomes as well as other omics approaches that we are currently pursuing, including transcriptomics, epigenomics, and single-cell genomics.