We report the first occurrence of the orange spiny whitefly (Aleurocanthus spiniferus; OSW) on the tree of heaven (Ailanthus altissima) in Bari, Apulia region, Italy. After our first observation in 2016, the infestation recurred regularly during the following years and expanded to the neighboring trees. Since then, we have also found the insect on numerous patches of the tree of heaven and other plant species in the Bari province. Nevertheless, the tree of heaven was not particularly threatened by the insect, so that a possible contribution by OSW for the control of such an invasive plant cannot be hypothesized hitherto. This work was also aimed at profiling the microbiome of OSW feeding on A. altissima. For this purpose, we used the denaturing gradient gel electrophoresis (DGGE) and the deep sequencing of small RNAs (sRNAs). Both techniques unveiled the presence of “Candidatus Portiera” (primary endosymbiont), Wolbachia sp. and Rickettsia sp., endosymbionts already reported for other Aleyrodidae. Deep sequencing data were analyzed by four computational pipelines in order to understand the reliability of the detection of fungi, bacteria, and viruses: Kraken, Kaiju, Velvet, and VelvetOptimiser. Some contigs assembled by Velvet or VelvetOptimiser were associated with insects, but not necessarily in the Aleurocanthus genus or Aleyrodidae family, suggesting the non-specificity of sRNAs or possible traces of parasitoids in the sample (e.g., Eretmocerus sp.). Finally, deep sequencing data were used to describe the microtranscriptome of OSW: 56 canonical and at least four high-confidence novel microRNAs (miRNAs) were identified. The overall miRNA abundance in OSW was in agreement with previous works on Bemisia tabaci, and bantam-3p, miR-276a-3p, miR-317-3p, miR-750-3p, and mir-8-3p were the most represented miRNAs.

中文翻译：

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Aleurocanthus spiniferus 对臭椿的首次报告：昆虫微生物组和 MicroRNA 的分析


我们报告了意大利普利亚地区巴里的天堂树（ Ailanthus altissima ）上首次出现橙色刺粉虱（ Aleurocanthus spiniferus ；OSW）。在我们 2016 年第一次观察到之后，虫害在接下来的几年里定期复发，并扩展到邻近的树木。从那时起，我们还在巴里省的许多天堂树和其他植物物种上发现了这种昆虫。然而，天堂树并没有受到这种昆虫的特别威胁，因此迄今为止还不能假设 OSW 对控制这种入侵植物可能做出的贡献。这项工作还旨在分析以A. altissima为食的 OSW 的微生物组。为此，我们使用了变性梯度凝胶电泳 (DGGE) 和小 RNA (sRNA) 深度测序。两种技术都揭示了“ Candidatus Portiera”（初级内共生体） Wolbachia sp. 的存在。和立克次体，已经报道了其他粉虱科的内共生体。通过四个计算管道对深度测序数据进行分析，以了解真菌、细菌和病毒检测的可靠性：Kraken、Kaiju、Velvet 和 VelvetOptimiser。 Velvet 或 VelvetOptimiser 组装的一些重叠群与昆虫相关，但不一定属于粉刺粉虱属或粉粉虱科，这表明 sRNA 的非特异性或样品中可能存在寄生蜂的痕迹（例如Eretmocerus sp.）。最后，深度测序数据被用来描述 OSW 的微转录组：鉴定出 56 个典型的和至少 4 个高可信度的新型 microRNA (miRNA)。 OSW 中的总体 miRNA 丰度与之前对烟粉虱的研究结果一致，bantam-3p、miR-276a-3p、miR-317-3p、miR-750-3p 和 mir-8-3p 是最具代表性的 miRNA 。