Genomics of the Scale Insect Puto echinatus and its Endosymbionts

The insect Puto echinatus is a type of scale insect) found in the order Hemiptera in the superfamily Coccoidae. P. echinatus survives on a diet of sap from various host plants and are found more numerously in warmer climates. Due to their limited diet, it hosts a maternally inherited endosymbiotic bacteria that has a small genome (~1.2 megabases). Typically, insect endosymbiont genomes are reduced with few genes that are preserved, typically in the area of DNA repair, replication, and amino acid metabolism. In addition these genomes have more A and T base pairs, decreased Tm of the genome, and increased expression of chaperones. The scale insect had its DNA extracted using a Qiagen Dneasy kit and then sequenced on an Ion Torrent machine. The bacterial genome was then assembled with an MIRA assembler and annotated on Geneious. By sequencing the P. echinatus endosymbiont genome there will hopefully be some understanding in what amino acids and proteins P. echinauts is unable process. This may lead to an understanding of how the symbionts coevolve alongside the scale insect from the genus Puto. Based on previous genes sequenced from Puto we will learn more about the evolutionary history of symbiosis in this genus.