Phylogenetic analysis of defensins from different ant species.

<p>All defensin sequences were aligned by MUSCLE and a BioNJ-tree with 100 bootstrap replicates was calculated. Branches with a bootstrap support below 40 were removed. Other bootstrap values are indicated. The genes for the gene tree were generated using the gene prediction pipeline maker and hand curated. The gene tree was rooted at the defensin from <i>Ixodes scapularis</i> (GenBank Acc. No.: XP_002436104.1). The <i>A. mellifera</i> defensin-1 forms a clade with proteins formerly described as defensin-2, which gives a first indication that they could be renamed accordingly. However, some of the proteins form a clade with the <i>A. mellifera</i> defensin-2. Moreover, two species <i>S. invicta</i> and <i>C. floridanus,</i> own both defensins. Therefore, we suggest a duplication event at the LCA of <i>A. mellifera</i> and the ant species.