Orally Delivered Scorpion Antimicrobial Peptides Exhibit Activity against Pea Aphid (Acyrthosiphon pisum) and Its Bacterial Symbionts.

ABSTRACT: Aphids are severe agricultural pests that damage crops by feeding on phloem sap and vectoring plant pathogens. Chemical insecticides provide an important aphid control strategy, but alternative and sustainable control measures are required to avoid rapidly emerging resistance, environmental contamination, and the risk to humans and beneficial organisms. Aphids are dependent on bacterial symbionts, which enable them to survive on phloem sap lacking essential nutrients, as well as conferring environmental stress tolerance and resistance to parasites. The evolution of aphids has been accompanied by the loss of many immunity-related genes, such as those encoding antibacterial peptides, which are prevalent in other insects, probably because any harm to the bacterial symbionts would inevitably a

SUBMITTER: Luna-Ramirez K 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC5618194 | biostudies-literature | 2017 Aug

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature