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Lookup NU author(s): Dr Alun JonesORCiD
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License (CC BY 4.0).
© The Author(s) 2026. Published by Oxford University Press on behalf of Society for Molecular Biology and Evolution.Subsociality and wood-eating or xylophagy are understood as key drivers in the evolution of eusociality in Blattodea (cockroaches and termites), two features observed in the cockroach genus Cryptocercus, the sister group of all termites. We analyze two high-quality genomes from this genus, C. punctulatus from North America and C. meridianus from Southeast Asia, to explore the evolutionary transitions to xylophagy and subsociality within Blattodea. Our analyses reveal evidence of relaxed selection in both Cryptocercus and termites, indicating that a reduction in effective population size may have occurred in their subsocial ancestors. These findings challenge the expected positive correlation between dN/dS ratios and social complexity, as Cryptocercus exhibits elevated dN/dS values that may exceed those of eusocial termites. Additionally, we infer a reduction in the number of Ionotropic Receptors and a change from uni- to bimodal methylation signatures in protein coding genes in a common ancestor of Cryptocercus and termites, mechanisms previously thought to have evolved with the emergence of eusociality in termites. Future studies incorporating additional genomic data from diverse blattodean species can further build on these findings and provide deeper insights into the molecular mechanisms driving transitions to xylophagy and eusociality.
Author(s): Jones ARC, Mikhailova AA, Aumont C, Berger J, Liu C, He S, Wang Z, Winkler S, Bornberg-Bauer E, Legendre F, McMahon DP, Harrison MC
Publication type: Article
Publication status: Published
Journal: Genome Biology and Evolution
Year: 2026
Volume: 18
Issue: 2
Print publication date: 06/02/2026
Online publication date: 06/02/2026
Acceptance date: 01/02/2026
Date deposited: 09/03/2026
ISSN (electronic): 1759-6653
Publisher: Oxford University Press
URL: https://doi.org/10.1093/gbe/evag028
DOI: 10.1093/gbe/evag028
Data Access Statement: The C. punctulatus genome assembly (GCA_054643855.1) and raw ONT reads of C. punctulatus are available on NCBI within the project PRJNA1188519. All other data, including gene annotations, and scripts are available on Dryad: https://doi.org/10.5061/dryad.np5hqc04p
PubMed id: 41655980
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