Nicrophorus orbicollis Transcriptome or Gene expression. Nicrophorus orbicollis

Burying beetles (Nicrophorus spp.) are unique from most insects in that they provide parental care while not belonging to the eusocial class of insects such as ants or bees. This behavior of Nicrophorus beetles produces demonstrable energy costs as evidenced by immune deficits and much shorter life-spans in reproducing beetles. Relatively little is known concerning the molecular biology of this beetle and an assembled transcriptome would serve as a resource for the study of this organism and its molecular response during reproduction. The goal of this study is the assembly of the Nicrophorus orbicollis transcriptome from beetles at varying development stages. RNA-Seq reads were obtained by next-generation sequencing on an Illumina® NextSeq 500 platform.