| Title: | (E)-beta-farnesene synthase genes affect aphid (Myzus persicae) infestation in tobacco (Nicotiana tabacum) |
| Author(s): | Yu X; Jones HD; Ma Y; Wang G; Xu Z; Zhang B; Zhang Y; Ren G; Pickett JA; Xia L; |
| Address: | "Institute of Crop Science/The National Key Facility for Crop Gene Resources and Genetic Improvement, Chinese Academy of Agricultural Sciences (CAAS), 12 Zhongguancun South Street, Beijing 100081, China" |
| DOI: | 10.1007/s10142-011-0244-1 |
| ISSN/ISBN: | 1438-7948 (Electronic) 1438-793X (Linking) |
| Abstract: | "Aphids are major agricultural pests which cause significant yield losses of the crop plants each year. (E)-beta-farnesene (EbetaF) is the alarm pheromone involved in the chemical communication between aphids and particularly in the avoidance of predation. In the present study, two EbetaF synthase genes were isolated from sweet wormwood and designated as AabetaFS1 and AabetaFS2, respectively. Overexpression of AabetaFS1 or AabetaFS2 in tobacco plants resulted in the emission of EbetaF ranging from 1.55 to 4.65 ng/day/g fresh tissues. Tritrophic interactions involving the peach aphids (Myzus persicae), predatory lacewings (Chrysopa septempunctata) demonstrated that the transgenic tobacco expressing AabetaFS1 and AabetaFS2 could repel peach aphids, but not as strongly as expected. However, AabetaFS1 and AabetaFS2 lines exhibited strong and statistically significant attraction to lacewings. Further experiments combining aphids and lacewing larvae in an octagon arrangement showed transgenic tobacco plants could repel aphids and attract lacewing larvae, thus minimizing aphid infestation. Therefore, we demonstrated a potentially valuable strategy of using EbetaF synthase genes from sweet wormwood for aphid control in tobacco or other economic important crops in an environmentally benign way" |
| Keywords: | "Animals Aphids/*physiology Artemisia/enzymology Genetic Engineering Larva/physiology Pest Control, Biological Plant Proteins/*genetics/metabolism Plants, Genetically Modified Predatory Behavior Pyrophosphatases/*genetics/metabolism Recombinant Proteins/ge;" |
| Notes: | "MedlineYu, Xiudao Jones, Huw D Ma, Youzhi Wang, Genping Xu, Zhaoshi Zhang, Baoming Zhang, Yongjun Ren, Guangwei Pickett, John A Xia, Lanqin eng Biotechnology and Biological Sciences Research Council/United Kingdom Research Support, Non-U.S. Gov't Germany 2011/08/19 Funct Integr Genomics. 2012 Mar; 12(1):207-13. doi: 10.1007/s10142-011-0244-1. Epub 2011 Aug 17" |
