Dataset Information

Asynchrony between Host Plant and Insects-Defoliator within a Tritrophic System: The Role of Herbivore Innate Immunity.

ABSTRACT: The effects of asynchrony in the phenology of spring-feeding insect-defoliators and their host plants on insects' fitness, as well as the importance of this effect for the population dynamics of outbreaking species of insects, is a widespread and well-documented phenomenon. However, the spreading of this phenomenon through the food chain, and especially those mechanisms operating this spreading, are still unclear. In this paper, we study the effect of seasonally declined leafquality (estimated in terms of phenolics and nitrogen content) on herbivore fitness, immune parameters and resistance against pathogen by using the silver birch Betula pendula--gypsy moth Lymantria dispar--nucleopolyhedrovirus as the tritrophic system. We show that a phenological mismatch induced by the delay in the emergence of gypsy moth larvae and following feeding on mature leaves has negative effects on the female pupal weight, on the rate of larval development and on the activity of phenoloxidase in the plasma of haemolymph. In addition, the larval susceptibility to exogenous nucleopolyhydrovirus infection as well as covert virus activation were both enhanced due to the phenological mismatch. The observed effects of phenological mismatch on insect-baculovirus interaction may partially explain the strong and fast fluctuations in the population dynamics of the gypsy moth that is often observed in the studied part of the defoliator area. This study also reveals some indirect mechanisms of effect related to host plant quality, which operate through the insect innate immune status and affect resistance to both exogenous and endogenous virus.

SUBMITTER: Martemyanov VV

PROVIDER: S-EPMC4482610 | biostudies-literature | 2015

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature

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Asynchrony between Host Plant and Insects-Defoliator within a Tritrophic System: The Role of Herbivore Innate Immunity.

Martemyanov Vyacheslav V VV Pavlushin Sergey V SV Dubovskiy Ivan M IM Yushkova Yuliya V YV Morosov Sergey V SV Chernyak Elena I EI Efimov Vadim M VM Ruuhola Teija T Glupov Victor V VV

PloS one 20150626 6

The effects of asynchrony in the phenology of spring-feeding insect-defoliators and their host plants on insects' fitness, as well as the importance of this effect for the population dynamics of outbreaking species of insects, is a widespread and well-documented phenomenon. However, the spreading of this phenomenon through the food chain, and especially those mechanisms operating this spreading, are still unclear. In this paper, we study the effect of seasonally declined leafquality (estimated i ...[more]

PMID: 26115118

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Project description:The dynamics of occurrence of target organs in plant populations produces windows of opportunity that directly and indirectly affect the structure of herbivore communities. However, mechanisms that drive herbivore specialization between resource patches are still poorly known. In this study, we tested three hypotheses related to variation in host plant phenology and community structure (i.e., composition, richness, and abundance) of gall-forming species: (a) plants with early leaf-flushing in the season will have greater vegetative growth and high contents of secondary chemical compounds; (b) gall-inducing insect community structure changes among temporary resource patches of the host; and (c) interspecific competition is a probable mechanism that drives gall-inducing insect community structure on Copaifera langsdorffii. We monitored daily a total of 102 individuals of the super-host C. langsdorffii from August 2012 to May 2013, to characterize the leaf flushing time of each host plant. The leaf flushing time had a positive relationship with the number of folioles per branch and a negative relationship with branch growth. We sampled a total of 4,906 galls belonging to 24 gall-inducing insect species from 102 individuals of C. langsdorffii. In spite of some gall-inducing species presented high abundance on early leaf-flushing plants, direct and indirect effects of plant phenology on galling insect abundance was species dependent. At the community level, our study revealed that the quality and quantity of plant resources did not affect the richness and abundance of gall-inducing insects associated with C. langsdorffii. However, the richness and composition of gall-inducing species varied according to the variation in leaf flushing time of the host plant. The results of null model analysis showed that galls co-occurrence on C. langsdorffii trees differ more than expected by chance and that interspecific competition can be one potential mechanism structuring this gall-inducing insect community.

Dataset Information

Asynchrony between Host Plant and Insects-Defoliator within a Tritrophic System: The Role of Herbivore Innate Immunity.

Publications

Asynchrony between Host Plant and Insects-Defoliator within a Tritrophic System: The Role of Herbivore Innate Immunity.

Similar Datasets

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