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Different phenotypic plastic responses to predators observed among aphid lineages specialized on different host plants.

ABSTRACT: The role of intraspecific variation in the magnitude and direction of plastic responses in ecology and evolution is increasingly recognized. However, the factors underlying intraspecific variation in plastic responses remain largely unexplored, particularly for the hypothesis that the herbivores' phenotypic response to predators might vary amongst lineages associated with different host plants. Here, we tested whether plant-specialized lineages of the pea aphid, Acyrthosiphon pisum, differed in their transgenerational phenotypic response to ladybird predators (i.e., the asexual production of winged offspring by wingless mothers). In a full factorial laboratory experiment, we found that six aphid clonal lineages each specialized either on alfalfa or clover significantly differed in their transgenerational phenotypic response to predators. Some lineages produced an increased number of winged aphids in predator presence while others did not respond. Aphid lineages specialized on alfalfa had stronger phenotypic responses to predators than those specialized on clover. Although we tested only six aphid lineages from two biotypes, our results imply that intraspecific variation in prey phenotypic response of herbivores to predators differs amongst lineages specialized on different host plants. Our findings therefore raise the question of the influence of plant specialization in shaping herbivore phenotypic responses, and highlight the need to consider multi-trophic interactions to understand the causes and consequences of intraspecific variation in complex phenotypic traits.

SUBMITTER: Sentis A

PROVIDER: S-EPMC6588606 | biostudies-literature | 2019 Jun

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature

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Different phenotypic plastic responses to predators observed among aphid lineages specialized on different host plants.

Sentis Arnaud A Bertram Raphaël R Dardenne Nathalie N Ramon-Portugal Felipe F Louit Ines I Le Trionnaire Gaël G Simon Jean-Christophe JC Magro Alexandra A Pujol Benoit B Hemptinne Jean-Louis JL Danchin Etienne E

Scientific reports 20190621 1

The role of intraspecific variation in the magnitude and direction of plastic responses in ecology and evolution is increasingly recognized. However, the factors underlying intraspecific variation in plastic responses remain largely unexplored, particularly for the hypothesis that the herbivores' phenotypic response to predators might vary amongst lineages associated with different host plants. Here, we tested whether plant-specialized lineages of the pea aphid, Acyrthosiphon pisum, differed in ...[more]

PMID: 31227730

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Project description:Polyphagous aphids often consist of host-specialized lineages, which have greater fitness on their native hosts than on others. The underlying causes are important for understanding of the evolution of diet breadth and host shift of aphids. The cotton-melon aphid Aphis gossypii Glover is extremely polyphagous with many strict host-specialized lineages. Whether and how the lineage specialized on the primary host hibiscus shifts to the secondary host cucumber remains elusive. We found that the hibiscus-specialized lineage suffered high mortality and gave birth to very few nymphs developing into yellow dwarfs on fresh cucumber leaves, and did not inflict any damage symptoms on cucumber plants. The poor performance did not improve with prolonged exposure to cucumber; however, it did significantly improve when the cucumber leaves were pre-infected with a biotrophic phytopathogen Pseudoperonospora cubensis. More importantly, the hibiscus-specialized lineage with two-generation feeding experience on pre-infected cucumber leaves performed as well as the cucumber-specialized lineage did on fresh cucumber leaves, and inflicted typical damage symptoms on intact cucumber plants. Electrical penetration graph (EPG) indicated that the hibiscus-specialized lineage did not ingest phloem sap from fresh cucumber leaves but succeeded in ingesting phloem sap from pre-infected cucumber leaves, which explained the performance improvement of the hibiscus-specialized lineage on pre-infected cucumber leaves. This study revealed a new pathway for the hibiscus-specialized lineage to quickly acclimate to cucumber under the assistance of the phytopathogen. We considered that the short feeding experience on pre-infected cucumber may activate expression of effector genes that are related to specific host utilization. We suggest to identify host-specific effectors by comparing proteomes or/and transcriptomes of the hibiscus-specialized lineage before and after acclimating to cucumber.

Dataset Information

Different phenotypic plastic responses to predators observed among aphid lineages specialized on different host plants.

Publications

Different phenotypic plastic responses to predators observed among aphid lineages specialized on different host plants.

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