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Abstract
Colorado potato beetle (CPB) is an agricultural pest of solanaceous crops, notorious for its rapid resistance development to chemical pesticides. Foliar spraying of dsRNA formulations is a promising innovative technology providing highly specific and environmentally acceptable option for CPB management. We designed dsRNA to silence CPB mesh gene (dsMESH) and performed laboratory feeding trials to assess impacts on beetle survival and development. We compared the effectiveness of in vivo and in vitro produced dsRNA in a series of laboratory experiments. We additionally performed a field trial in which the efficacy of dsRNA sprayed onto potato foliage was compared to a spinosad-based insecticide. We showed that dsMESH ingestion consistently and significantly impaired larval growth and decreased larval survival in laboratory feeding experiments. In vivo produced dsRNA performed similarly as in vitro synthesized dsRNA in laboratory settings. In the field trial, dsMESH was as effective in controlling CPB larvae as a commercial spinosad insecticide, its activity was however slower. We discuss limitations and benefits of a potential dsMESH-based CPB management strategy and list some important RNAi based CPB research topics, which will have to be addressed in future.
Highlights
Colorado potato beetle (CPB), Leptinotarsa decemlineata, is a serious pest of potato and other solanaceous crops
This expression pattern is suitable for RNA interference (RNAi) insecticide targets as the gene is expressed in stages in which the beetles feed on plant leaves
Mesh was first identified as an effective RNAi pesticide target in western corn rootworm, Diabrotica virgifera virgifera, another coleopteran pest closely related to CPB (Hu et al, 2016)
Summary
Colorado potato beetle (CPB), Leptinotarsa decemlineata, is a serious pest of potato and other solanaceous crops. Double-stranded RNAs (dsRNAs) have the advantage of high selectivity towards the target organism and rapid environmental degradation into non-toxic compounds (Dubelman et al, 2014; Albright et al, 2017) This novel pest management approach has the potential to decrease the extensive use of conventional insecticides. In CPB, Validating dsMESH in Feeding Trials unlike some other insects, dsRNAs are not degraded by gut nucleases, are efficiently taken up by the gut epithelium cells, and can trigger local as well as systemic RNAi response (Cappelle et al, 2016) This makes CPB an excellent candidate for pest management using dsRNAs, which was first recognized in a study by Baum et al (2007) that has identified several RNAi targets. They showed that silencing mesh impairs midgut barrier function which results in increased larval mortality (Hu et al, 2019)
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