Identification of microRNAs and their response to the stress of plant allelochemicals in Aphis gossypii (Hemiptera: Aphididae)

BACKGROUND: MicroRNAs (miRNAs) are a group of short non-coding RNAs involved in the inhibition of protein translation or in mRNA degradation. Although the regulatory roles of miRNAs in various biological processes have been investigated, there is as yet an absence of studies about the regulatory roles of miRNAs involved in the metabolism of plant allelochemicals in insects. RESULTS: We constructed five small RNA libraries from apterous Aphis gossypii adults that had fed on an artificial diet containing various allelochemicals. Using Illumina sequencing, a total of 73.27 million clean reads was obtained, and 292 miRNAs were identified from A. gossypii. Comparative analysis of read counts indicated that both conserved and novel miRNAs were differently expressed among the five libraries, and the differential expression was validated via qRT-PCR. We found that the transcript levels of several miRNAs were increased or decreased in all of the allelochemical treatment libraries compared to the control. The putative target genes of the miRNAs were predicted using in silico tools, and the target genes of several miRNAs were presumed to be involved in the metabolism of xenobiotic compounds. Furthermore, the target prediction results were confirmed using dual luciferase reporter assay, and Ago-miR-656a-3p was demonstrated to regulate the expression of CYP6J1 post-transcriptionally through binding to the 3′ UTR of CYP6J1. CONCLUSION: Our research results indicate that miRNAs may be involved in the metabolism of plant allelochemicals in A. gossypii, and these results also represent an important new small RNA genomics resource for further studies on this topic. ELECTRONIC SUPPLEMENTARY MATERIAL: The online version of this article (doi:10.1186/s12867-017-0080-5) contains supplementary material, which is available to authorized users.