Isolation and cultivation of endosymbiotic Pseudomonads from the rove beetle genera

Grako678 D1

From 01/2004 to 12/2007

Staff: Konrad Dettner, Carlo Unverzagt, O. Meyer, Klaus H. Hoffmann
Grant: GK 678/2 Graduate College 678: Ecological Significance of Natural Compounds and other Signals in Insects - from Structure to Function

The rove beetle Paederus and isolated microorganisms of the genera Pseudomonas The two rove beetle genera Paederus and Paederidus hold the cytotoxical amid pederin, that belongs to a group of antitumor compounds which were also found in other animal genera like for example in marine sponges. The beetles use it as chemical defense against predators like wolfspiders. An additional defense effect of this hemolymph toxin against fungi of the genera Laboulbeniales has still to be proved. The putative producer of this nature substance pederin is a bacterial endosymbiont, that could be identified with different molecularbiological and phylogenetical methods. This bacterium is very closely related to the ubiquitous microorganism Pseudomonas aeruginosa and is as yet unculturable with conventional methods. However, molecular researches of the endosymbiotic DNA revealed the existence of a functional tellurite resistance operon. This resistance against tellurite salts can be used among other things for cultivation experiments to selectively obtain the unknown endosymbiont as well as special media for the exclusive breeding of different Pseudomonads

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