Using NGS to elucidate trophic relationships and to assess the community ecology in fig wasps

• Grant number: 22/11911-3
• Support Opportunities: Regular Research Grants
• Duration: February 01, 2023 - January 31, 2025
• Field of knowledge: Biological Sciences - Ecology
• Principal Investigator: Rodrigo Augusto Santinelo Pereira
• Grantee: Rodrigo Augusto Santinelo Pereira
• Host Institution: Faculdade de Filosofia, Ciências e Letras de Ribeirão Preto (FFCLRP). Universidade de São Paulo (USP). Ribeirão Preto , SP, Brazil
• Associated researchers: Astrid Cruaud ; Jean Yves Rasplus

Abstract

One of the great challenges in ecology is to understand how species in communities interact and how complex communities organize, function and evolve. To overcome these challenges, it is necessary to obtain quantitative data on composition and structure of community on spatial and temporal scales, and to elucidate the trophic relationships between species in the community. Obtaining these data is often impractical using only field experiments and sample-counting methods. In this context, Next Generation Sequencing (NGS) is revolutionizing the monitoring of biodiversity and community ecology, through the analysis of billions of nucleotides, in a method of high productivity and relatively low cost. In the present proposal, we use the wasp community associated with a Ficus species as a model to develop a protocol of molecular analysis, based on NGS to identify and quantify fig wasps on a large scale, and elucidate the trophic relationships between wasp species from the identification of DNA contained in galls occupied by larvae of more than one wasp species. The data produced will allow us to assess the variation of the community structure of wasps, using metrics of diversity and network interactions. All the biological material necessary for the project has already been collected. The development of the molecular protocol will be carried out in partnership with French researchers from INRAe, which are reference in the area and have all the infrastructure for obtaining and analyzing the molecular data. The project will also result in technology transfer to the Brazilian institution, as the associated researchers will share the analysis methodology and they will supervise a "sandwich" internship in France of a PhD candidate supervised by the beneficiary of the present proposal. (AU)