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The Wood-Eating Termite Hindgut: Diverse Cellular Symbioses in a Microoxic to Anoxic Environment

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Anoxia

Part of the book series: Cellular Origin, Life in Extreme Habitats and Astrobiology ((COLE,volume 21))

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Abstract

The wood-eating termites evolved 140 million years ago in the Early Cretaceous. Symbiotic microbial communities developed in their hindguts that allowed them to survive on a diet of lignocelluloses, and coevolved into an obligate association that was vertically transmitted through the colony. A typical gut’s microbial community consists of several types of anaerobic protists and hundreds of prokaryotes, many of which are specialized to the gut, and include novel chemoautotrophic forms. Gut-inhabiting protists harbor ecto- and endosymbiotic prokaryotes that have been studied as analogs of early cellular evolution. Genomic studies have revealed a great deal more molecular genetic diversity in the community than was previously known, and are producing the first complete genomes of the bacterial endosymbionts. Experimental studies of the community have lagged because many of the organisms have proven difficult to culture.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Geosciences Department, University of Massachusetts, Amherst, MA, 01003, USA

    Michael F. Dolan

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  1. Michael F. Dolan
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Correspondence to Michael F. Dolan .

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Editors and Affiliations

  1. , Dept. for Earth and Environmental Resear, Ludwig-maximilians-University, Richard-Wagner-Str. 10, Munich, 80333, Germany

    Alexander V. Altenbach

  2. , Geology & Geophysics Department, Wood Hole Oceanographic Institution, Woods Hole Road 266, Woods Hole, 02543, Massachusetts, USA

    Joan M. Bernhard

  3. Jerusalem, The Hebrew University Of, P.O.Box 1132, Efrat, 90435, Israel

    Joseph Seckbach

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Dolan, M.F. (2012). The Wood-Eating Termite Hindgut: Diverse Cellular Symbioses in a Microoxic to Anoxic Environment. In: Altenbach, A., Bernhard, J., Seckbach, J. (eds) Anoxia. Cellular Origin, Life in Extreme Habitats and Astrobiology, vol 21. Springer, Dordrecht. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-94-007-1896-8_9

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