The Effect of Antibiotic Treatment on the Bacterial Community of the Brown Planthopper and Its Correlation with Rice Virulence

Xiaorong Xu,Liang Chen,Ming Tang,Hantao Zhou

doi:10.3390/agronomy11112327

Abstract

The prevention and control of planthoppers represent important issues for rice production. Current long-term control methods rely on pesticides, which raise concerns about environmental pollution. Recently, evidence has suggested that bacterial symbionts are important factors influencing the formation of Hemiptera insect biotypes and the selection of host plants for insects, which suggesting that targeting bacterial communities may be an effective alternative method for planthopper control. In this study, we perturbed the bacterial communities of the brown planthopper, Nilaparvata lugens, by feeding antibiotic-treated rice and used RNA-seq to examine the transcriptome of normal rice fed with perturbed BPHs by RNA-seq. Our results showed that the composition of the bacterial communities significantly changed after the perturbation, which was accompanied by changes in distinct biological processes of rice, especially the phenylpropanoid biosynthesis pathway, compared with the effect of the BPH feeding on rice without bacterial communities perturbation. Our work establishes a protocol for bacterial communities perturbation in BPH, demonstrating the link between bacterial community and the responses to BPH feeding and providing new insights into the interaction between BPH and rice.

Highlights

The brown planthopper (BPH), Nilaparvata lugens (Homoptera: Delphacidae), is a destructive phloem sap pest that costs heavy yield losses worldwide [1]
Because it is challenging to feed antibiotics directly to the BPH, we perturbed the bacterial communities by providing the BPH antibiotic-treated rice to explore the possible role of the bacterial communities of BPH (Figure 1)
Rice was treated with/without rifampicin in the 1/2 MS culture solution for 48 h, BPHs were fed on the rice sheath

Summary

Introduction

The brown planthopper (BPH), Nilaparvata lugens (Homoptera: Delphacidae), is a destructive phloem sap pest that costs heavy yield losses worldwide [1]. There are typically two types of damage caused by BPH: direct and indirect damage. Direct damage is caused by BPH sucking on the leaf sheath and blades of the rice, which results in yellow leaves and decreases the rate of heading sprouting and seed setting. This kind of damage can block the transportation of the photosynthesis product to the root, affecting the normal growth and physiological activities of rice [3]. Indirect damage is caused by the spread of rice diseases by BPH. The diseases spread by BPH have caused even more severe losses than direct damage [4]

Results

Discussion

Conclusion