Using Mitochondrial DNA Similarity Percentages to Analyze the Maternal Source of Hybrid Bees from Two Honey Bee Subspecies

Abstract

Hybridization between honey bee subspecies is common and hybrid bees can completely or partial replace the endemic bee subspecies as happened in some countries including Egypt. This study aimed to develop a new method to identify the maternal source of hybrid bees and to compare between sequences. The method (Similarity percentages of nucleotides) depends on using specific numerical system to nucleotides. The method was tested to identify the maternal source of hybrid bees from two honey bee subspecies Apis mellifera scutellata and Apis mellifera capensis based on similarity percentages in mtDNA sequences. The mtDNA sequence of the hybrid bees was more similar to A. m. capensis than A. m. scutellata, suggesting that the maternal source of the hybrid bees belonged to A. m. capensis. Results of the shared gene cluster analysis and similarity percentages based on 13 genes confirmed the similarity trend between the two subspecies and their hybrid. Additionally, specific primers to separate the two subspecies than their hybrid were designed based on the results of similarity percentages and tested using SnapGene. The trend of data analysis used in this study showed high ability to detect the similarities between the two subspecies and their hybrid. Also, this method can be used to identify the maternal source of hybrid bees including those exposed to a long period of hybridization (e.g. hybrid bees of Egypt), to specify the identical parts of the sequence, and to design specific primers to separate subspecies than their hybrids. The method presented in this study is likely to be very important tool to specify the maternal source of breeding stocks during genetic improvement programs of honey bees.

Keywords

• hybrids
• apis mellifera
• sequences
• bioinformatics