Abstract
Simple SummarySince the widespread adoption of Bt cotton in the late 1990s, the green mirid bug, Apolygus lucorum (Hemiptera: Miridae), has become one of the most important pests in cotton fields and some other crops. To manage this destructive pest, Peristenus spretus (Hymenoptera: Braconidae) has been tested in augmentative biological control. In this study, after cotton plants were damaged by different densities of A. lucorum, the behavioral responses of A. lucorum and P. spretus to cotton plants volatiles were evaluated, and the quality and quantity of volatiles from cotton plants were analyzed. The results demonstrated that HIPVs emitted by plants in response to A. lucorum could be influenced by the pest density and could be identified by P. spretus as a signal of the host. Our results would help understand how P. spretus plays a role in biological control against A. lucorum.Plants would release herbivore-induced plant volatiles (HIPVs) to repel herbivores and attract natural enemies after being damaged by herbivores. In this study, after cotton plants were damaged by different densities of Apolygus lucorum, the behavioral responses of A. lucorum and Peristenus spretus to cotton plants volatiles were evaluated, and the quality and quantity of volatiles from cotton plants were analyzed. Only when cotton plants were damaged by four bugs did both A. lucorum and P. spretus show an obvious response to damaged cotton plants, which indicates that cotton defense is correlated with pest density. The collection and analysis of volatiles reveals that the increase in pest density results in the emission of new compounds and an increase in the total number of volatiles with an alteration in proportions among the compounds in the blend. These changes in volatile profiles might provide wasps and mirids with specific information on host habitat quality and thus could explain the behavioral responses of parasitoids and pests.
Highlights
Many herbivores attacked plants during their growth; plants were not merely passive victims of herbivore attacks, and a variety of mechanisms that contributed to their resistance would be reconfigured to tolerate the damage and stresses of natural ecosystems [1,2,3,4,5]
When plants perceived pest feeding damage, a series of defensive mechanisms would be activated to promote plant fitness, and herbivores were repelled while the natural enemies were attracted [4,30]
Our analysis showed that both the P. spretus and A. lucorum had no obvious preferences for the volatiles from the plant damaged by one bug
Summary
Many herbivores attacked plants during their growth; plants were not merely passive victims of herbivore attacks, and a variety of mechanisms that contributed to their resistance would be reconfigured to tolerate the damage and stresses of natural ecosystems [1,2,3,4,5]. Different chemical defense responses were induced by herbivory arthropods in different plants [6]. Subsequent repellency of herbivores and attraction of natural enemies were both determined by the herbivore-induced plant volatiles (HIPVs) [7,8,9,10]. The second class was called inducible volatile compounds, which have always been produced as a result of insect damage or oviposition [15,16]. They were emitted from the site of the wound and lasted for a period after herbivore removal [17,18]
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