Uso de marcadores microssatélites na análise de produtividade em Melipona scutellaris (Hymenoptera: apidae: meliponini)

Abstract

In Brazil there are over 190 species of bees of the tribe Meliponini, especially Melipona the genre that are more targeted for production of honey and pollen. Among the native species, "the stingless bee" Melipona scutellaris Latreille, 1811 popularly known as the Northeast Uruçu, stands out as economically useful, providing livelihood for several Brazilian families with products that exploit their creation activity called Meliponiculture. However, the creators make the intense multiplication of the hives without regard to the value of the selection or genetic improvement as a factor in increasing productivity. This study aimed to use microsatellite loci to comparing Melipona scutellaris colonies after genetic selection in order to verify a possible correlation between marker and more and less productives colonies. We sampled 30 colonies (five adult worker bees per colony) from an F2 generation classified as less productive and more for honey and pollen maintained and cultured at the Federal University Recôncavo Baiano of meliponary, city Cruz das Almas - BA. The total DNA sample was extracted and amplified by Polymerase Chain Reaction (PCR) using 10 microsatellite loci heterologous to the evaluation and was developed to two M. bicolor and eight developed for M. seminigra. Genotyping was performed with the aid of automated sequencer and data were analyzed with descriptive statistics programs. All microsatellite loci amplification products generated via polymerase chain reaction. The microsatellite loci proved polymorphic with a total of 56 different alleles, with sizes and varying frequency. The loci developed for M. seminigra and amplified the first time in M. scutellaris, showed heterozygosity observed higher and a number of alleles and higher when compared with the number of alleles and observed heterozygosity found in species of origin of the primers. Observed high frequency of alleles in the two classes of colonies. The average observed heterozygosity and mean genetic diversity for all loci analyzed had similar values for the two classes of colonies. Most loci presented in Hardy-Weinberg equilibrium, and the high frequency of alleles found the study for both classes of colonies reinforces the idea that microsatellite markers may be linked to important genes. Observed alleles with frequencies and sizes for both classes. Thus, you cannot safely infer that are related to productivity in M. scutellaris, requiring more research in this area.