Project using DLX in the lab of Xuguo Zhou, Department of Entomology

Gene expression profiling of undertaking behavior in the Reticulitermes flavipes

Goal and Objectives

Our overall goal of this study is to elucidate transcriptional signatures of R. flavipes workers in corpse cannibalism and burial. Specifically, this study (1) investigated gene expression changes in response to different death cues; and (2) comparatively analyzed biological functions and molecular pathways associated with different undertaking processes. Our role towards this research project is to provide the transcriptome assembly, using RSEM doing differential expression calculation and automated annotation.

Research Personnel

Jizhe Shi (Graduate student)

Quanquan Liu, 09/07/2020, Added on MCC cluster 08/02/2022

Software

Trinity: transcriptome assembly,
RSEM: to prepare transcriptome, to calculate expression, to compare differential expression
Bowtie2: reads alignment
IGV: visualization
JMP: statistical analysis, making heat maps and cluster

Trinity, RSEM, Bowtie would be used on dlx and have been already downloaded to the dlx account.

Publications

1. Sun, Q., K.F. Haynes, X. Zhou. 2017. Dynamic changes in death cues modulate risks and rewards of corpse management. Functional Ecology. In press
2. Sun Q., K. F. Haynes, X. Zhou. 2013. Differential undertaking response of a lower termite to congeneric and conspecific corpses. Scientific Reports 3:1650.
3. Sun Q., X. Zhou. 2013. Corpse management in social insects. International Journal of Biological Sciences 9(3):313-21.

Grants

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