Role of bacteria in providing defence against entomopathogens in the colony of odontotermes obesus

Abstract

Termites are eusocial insects that have evolved from cockroaches. Termites are soil or wood-inhabiting insects. There are various entomopathogens present in the soil environment. While nesting in soil, these eusocial insects are always in constant contact with these entomopathogens, but it is infrequent to observe a sudden outbreak of infections in termite colonies. These eusocial insects have evolved with various defence mechanisms to fight against such entomopathogens to reduce the chances of a sudden outbreak in their colony. Various past studies suggest that microbes present in their colony play a vital role to fight against entomopathogens. Odontotermes obesus is the most abundant fungus-growing termite throughout India and the model organism of our study. We hypothesise that microbes present in the Odontotermes obesus colony may play a significant role to fight against entomopathogenic fungi Metarhizium. This study tries to answer how entomopathogenic infections of Metarhizium are being prevented in the Odontotermes obesus colony.