Genome-wide identification, characterization of sugar transporter genes in the silkworm Bombyx mori and role in Bombyx mori nucleopolyhedrovirus (BmNPV) infection

• This is the first report on the multi gene complex of sugar transporter genes of silkworm Bombyx mori.
• Sugar transporters are exclusively up regulated in the susceptible breed indicating their possible role as viral receptors during BmNPV infection.
• Differential gene expression pattern of sugar transporter genes in the resistant and susceptible races was validated.

Sugar transporters play an essential role in controlling carbohydrate transport and are responsible for mediating the movement of sugars into cells. These genes exist as large multigene families within the insect genome. In insects, sugar transporters not only have a role in sugar transport, but may also act as receptors for virus entry. Genome-wide annotation of silkworm Bombyx mori (B. mori) revealed 100 putative sugar transporter (BmST) genes exists as a large multigene family and were classified into 11 sub families, through phylogenetic analysis. Chromosomes 27, 26 and 20 were found to possess the highest number of BmST paralogous genes, harboring 22, 7 and 6 genes, respectively. These genes occurred in clusters exhibiting the phenomenon of tandem gene duplication. The ovary, silk gland, hemocytes, midgut and malphigian tubules were the different tissues/cells enriched with BmST gene expression. The BmST gene BGIBMGA001498 had maximum EST transcripts of 134 and expressed exclusively in the malphigian tubule. The expression of EST transcripts of the BmST clustered genes on chromosome 27 was distributed in various tissues like testis, ovary, silk gland, malphigian tubule, maxillary galea, prothoracic gland, epidermis, fat body and midgut. Three sugar transporter genes (BmST) were constitutively expressed in the susceptible race and were down regulated upon BmNPV infection at 12 h post infection (hpi). The expression pattern of these three genes was validated through real-time PCR in the midgut tissues at different time intervals from 0 to 30 hpi. In the susceptible B. mori race, expression of sugar transporter genes was constitutively expressed making the host succumb to viral infection.