High temperature treatment optimized for symbiont suppression in an obligatory gut bacterial symbiosis in the stinkbug Plautia stali (Hemiptera: Pentatomidae)

The stinkbug Plautia stali develops a midgut symbiotic organ that harbors a specific bacterial symbiont indispensable for its growth and survival. Being maintainable in laboratory and tractable experimentally, P. stali is recently highlighted as a model system to investigate the mechanisms underpinning insect-microbe symbiotic interactions. In this study, we reared newly emerged adult insects of P. stali under different temperature conditions for 8 days and monitored how their symbiotic organs and symbiotic bacteria are affected. While all insects survived at temperatures from 25 to 37 °C, some insects died at 38 °C, 39 °C, and 40 °C, wherein mortality rates increased as temperature elevated. While the symbiotic organs of the normal insects exhibited vivid yellow color, the symbiotic organs of the insects reared at 35 °C or higher frequently exhibited abnormal colors, such as pale yellow, yellowish white, or white, the extent of which became more severe as temperature elevated. Symbiont quantification revealed that, while the symbiont titers were almost constant for 8 days at 25 °C and 30 °C, the symbiont titers on the 8th day drastically declined to 1/100 at 35 °C and 1/10000 at 37 °C and 39 °C. Based on these results, we propose that rearing at 37 °C for a week is a recommended treatment regime by which the symbiont is effectively suppressed with minimal damage to the host insect.