The genomic history and global migration of a windborne pest

Hu QL 1 , Zhuo JC 1 , Fang GQ 2 , Lu JB 1 , Ye YX 3 , Li DT 3 Show all authors , Lou YH 3 , Zhang XY 3 , Chen X 3 , Wang SL 3 , Wang ZC 3 , Zhang YX 2 , Mazlan N 4 , Oo SS 5 , Thet T 5 , Sharma PN 6 , Jauharlina J 7 , Sukorini IH 8 , Ibisate MT 9 , Rahman SMM 10 , Ansari NA 3 , Chen AD 11 , Zhu ZR 3 , Heong KL 3 , Lu G 1 , Huang HJ 1 , Li JM 1 , Chen JP 1 , Zhan S 2 , Zhang CX 1

Affiliations 

  • 1 State Key Laboratory for Managing Biotic and Chemical Threats to the Quality and Safety of Agro-Products, Key Laboratory of Biotechnology in Plant Protection of Ministry of Agriculture and Zhejiang Province, Institute of Plant Virology, Ningbo University, Ningbo 315211, China
  • 2 Key Laboratory of Plant Design, CAS Center for Excellence in Molecular Plant Sciences, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Shanghai 200032, China
  • 3 Institute of Insect Science, Zhejiang University, Hangzhou 310058, China
  • 4 Institute of Tropical Agriculture and Food Security, and Faculty of Agriculture, University Putra Malaysia, 43400 Serdang, Malaysia
  • 5 Taungoo University, Taungoo 05063, Myanmar
  • 6 Entomology Division, Nepal Agricultural Research Council, Khumaltar, Lalitpur, Kathmandu 44600, Nepal
  • 7 Department of Plant Protection, Faculty of Agriculture, Syiah Kuala University, Banda Aceh 23111, Indonesia
  • 8 Agrotechnology Study Program, Muhammadiyah University of Malang, Malang 65145, Indonesia
  • 9 College of Agriculture, Forestry and Environmental Sciences, Aklan State University, Banga, Aklan 5601, Philippines
  • 10 Sher-e-Bangla Agricultural University, Sher-e-Bangla Nagar, Dhaka 1207, Bangladesh
  • 11 Agriculture Environment and Resources Institute, Yunnan Academy of Agricultural Sciences, Kunming 650205, China
Sci Adv, 2024 Apr 26;10(17):eadk3852.
PMID: 38657063 DOI: 10.1126/sciadv.adk3852

Abstract

Many insect pests, including the brown planthopper (BPH), undergo windborne migration that is challenging to observe and track. It remains controversial about their migration patterns and largely unknown regarding the underlying genetic basis. By analyzing 360 whole genomes from around the globe, we clarify the genetic sources of worldwide BPHs and illuminate a landscape of BPH migration showing that East Asian populations perform closed-circuit journeys between Indochina and the Far East, while populations of Malay Archipelago and South Asia undergo one-way migration to Indochina. We further find round-trip migration accelerates population differentiation, with highly diverged regions enriching in a gene desert chromosome that is simultaneously the speciation hotspot between BPH and related species. This study not only shows the power of applying genomic approaches to demystify the migration in windborne migrants but also enhances our understanding of how seasonal movements affect speciation and evolution in insects.

* Title and MeSH Headings from MEDLINE®/PubMed®, a database of the U.S. National Library of Medicine.

MeSH terms
Similar publications