Is High Whitefly Abundance on Cassava in Sub-Saharan Africa Driven by Biological Traits of a Specific, Cryptic Bemisia tabaci Species?

ABSTRACT: In East Africa, the prevalent Bemisia tabaci whiteflies on the food security crop cassava are classified as sub-Saharan Africa (SSA) species. Economically damaging cassava whitefly populations were associated with the SSA2 species in the 1990s, but more recently, it has been to SSA1 species. To investigate whether biological traits (number of first instar nymphs, emerged adults, proportion of females in progeny and development time) of the cassava whitefly species are significant drivers of the observed field abundance, our study determined the development of SSA1 sub-group (SG) 1 (5 populations), SG2 (5 populations), SG3 (1 population) and SSA2 (1 population) on cassava and eggplant under laboratory conditions. SSA1-(SG1-SG2) and SSA2 populations' development traits were similar. Regardle

SUBMITTER: Mugerwa H 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC8003695 | biostudies-literature | 2021 Mar

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature