Details

Autor(en) / Beteiligte

• Fang, Weiguo
• Lu, Hsiao-Ling
• King, Glenn F
• St Leger, Raymond J

Titel

Construction of a hypervirulent and specific mycoinsecticide for locust control

Ist Teil von

• Scientific reports, 2014-12, Vol.4 (1), p.7345, Article 7345

Ort / Verlag

England: Nature Publishing Group

Erscheinungsjahr

2014

Link zum Volltext

Quelle

MEDLINE

Beschreibungen/Notizen

• Locusts and grasshoppers (acridids) are among the worst pests of crops and grasslands worldwide. Metarhizium acridum, a fungal pathogen that specifically infects acridids, has been developed as a control agent but its utility is limited by slow kill time and greater expense than chemical insecticides. We found that expression of four insect specific neurotoxins improved the efficacy of M. acridum against acridids by reducing lethal dose, time to kill and food consumption. Coinoculating recombinant strains expressing AaIT1(a sodium channel blocker) and hybrid-toxin (a blocker of both potassium and calcium channels), produced synergistic effects, including an 11.5-fold reduction in LC50, 43% reduction in LT50 and a 78% reduction in food consumption. However, specificity was retained as the recombinant strains did not cause disease in non-acridids. Our results identify a repertoire of toxins with different modes of action that improve the utility of fungi as specific control agents of insects.