MATA · Mitochondrial Adaptations associated with Thermophily in Ants
Horizon 2020 — Marie Skłodowska-Curie Actions
- Duration
- 2021-07-01 → 2023-06-30
- EU contribution
- €207,312
- Participants
- 1
- Scheme
- MSCA-IF
Lines connect the coordinator with its partners.
Results in brief
Mitochondrial Adaptations associated with Thermophily in Ants
Insects represent more than half of the world's biodiversity and are considered the most successful group of multicellular organisms on the planet. They contribute significantly to vital ecological services such as pollination, pest control, and maintenance of wildlife species. As opposed to homeotherm organisms which include mammals and birds, insects lack the ability to efficiently regulate their temperatures at the metabolic level. They nevertheless colonized most biomes on the planet, ranging from warm deserts to subarctic tundra, displaying a striking ability to readily adapt to novels and sometimes extreme conditions. In link with climate change, understanding these adaptations might prove pivotal in our ability to predict current and future climate warming will have on insect communities. This can give us the tools to better predict and mitigate some dire socioeconomic issues related to insects and climate change, such as its impact on worldwide food safety that relies on polenisators, the increased spread of new insect-borne diseases to temperate ecosystems, and overall the chronic resurgence of insect pests of economic/societal significance. Representing 14 000 described species, ants are one of the largest families of insects, with respect to species diversity and total number of individuals. They provide an unprecedented amount of ecosystem services by their sheer biomass and are an important part of nutrient cycling, soil turnover, and food web control. Associated with their global distribution, ants have evolved to tolerate highly variable thermal conditions. They thus represent a good model system to undertake the exploration of mechanisms underlying thermal adaptation in insects. The objective of MATA was thus to explore the physiological adaptations of insect life to temperatures using ants as models, with a focus on mitochondrial metabolism.
Data: CORDIS, © European Union
Project objective
Thermal tolerance is one of the most central traits that, in insects, correlate with distribution. With global temperatures projected to increase worldwide, much effort has been recently put into deciphering the physiological mechanisms constraining heat tolerance plasticity in ectotherms. However, we still know very little on how evolutionary pressures may have shaped physiological traits to enhance thermal tolerance in land insects. This is especially true in the case of mitochondrial functions, which have been repeatedly highlighted as central for ectotherms to survive exposition to non-optimal temperature regimes. Considering this central gap in our knowledge, we propose here to explore the mitochondrial adaptations associated with thermophily in insects, inside a consistent study system made of pairs of thermosensitive versus thermotolerant closely related ant species. Using this phylogenetic framework, we will (I) compare how temperatures affect specific steps along the mitochondrial Electron Transfer System (ETS) involved in respiration, (II) assess the impact of temperatures on mitochondrial ATP and ROS outputs, and (III) track adaptations in membrane composition and metabolic profiling associated with increased mitochondrial resilience to temperatures. Overall, this project thus proposes to explore important yet unanswered aspects of insect thermal biology that is located at the frontier of our current understanding of ecophysiology.
Original text from CORDIS.
Participants
- AARHUS UNIVERSITET · Aarhus CCoordinatorDenmark
Links
Data: CORDIS, © European Union