Scientists have for the first time sequenced the genome of New York City bed bugs, a discovery that could pave the way to develop insecticides to kill the bed bugs, Discovery News reports.
One group of researchers, led by the American Museum of Natural History's Jeffrey Rosenfeld, in a Nature Communications study, discovered that the genes in the bedbug, Cimex lectularius, are expressed the most after it feeds on blood for the first time.
The group found that bugs from different parts of the city had different genetic makeups.
Another group of scientists, also writing in Nature Communications, found that the bed bugs have 187 potential genes that allow them to repeatedly feed on humans without causing pain. The researchers also identified genes that make the bed bugs resistant to insecticide. They discovered that the proteins in the animals' cuticle prevent insecticide penetration and enzymes that detoxify the chemicals.
"Bedbugs are one of New York City's most iconic living fossils, along with cockroaches, meaning that their outward appearance has hardly changed throughout their long lineage," said one of the paper's corresponding authors George Amato, director of the Museum's Sackler Institute for Comparative Genomics.
"But despite their static look, we know that they continue to evolve, mostly in ways that make it harder for humans to dissociate with them. This work gives us the genetic basis to explore the bedbug's basic biology and its adaptation to dense human environments."
Researchers are hopeful that the discovered genome will help discover better insecticides for bed bugs and also help to better identify allergens associated with their infestation.
"Having this resources opens up a lot of potential new rounds of research in dealing with bed bugs," said the University of Cincinnati's Joshua Benoit, who was a co-author on the second paper and is part of the International Bed Bug Genome Project Collaboration, said in a statement. "In a year or two, we might actually develop better ways to control bed bugs."
For the study, the researchers extracted DNA and RNA from preserved and living collections, including samples from a population that was first collected in 1973 and has been maintained by American Museum of Natural History.
"It's not enough to just sequence a genome, because by itself it does not tell the full story," said Mark Siddall, one of the paper's corresponding authors and a curator in the Museum's Division of Invertebrate Zoology and Sackler Institute for Comparative Genomics.
"In addition to the DNA, you want to get the RNA, or the expressed genes, and you want that not just from a single bedbug, but from both males and females at each part of the life cycle. Then you can really start asking questions about how certain genes relate to blood-feeding, insecticide resistance, and other vital functions."
