Virulence of entomopathogenic fungi against fall armyworm, Spodoptera frugiperda (Lepidoptera: Noctuidae) under laboratory conditions

Atif Idrees; Ayesha Afzal; Ziyad Abdul Qadir; Jun Li

doi:10.3389/fphys.2023.1107434

Virulence of entomopathogenic fungi against fall armyworm, Spodoptera frugiperda (Lepidoptera: Noctuidae) under laboratory conditions

Front Physiol. 2023 Mar 8:14:1107434. doi: 10.3389/fphys.2023.1107434. eCollection 2023.

Authors

Atif Idrees^{1

2}, Ayesha Afzal^{1

3}, Ziyad Abdul Qadir^{4

5}, Jun Li¹

Affiliations

¹ Guangdong Key Laboratory of Animal Conservation and Resource Utilization, Guangdong Public Laboratory of Wild Animal Conservation and Utilization, Institute of Zoology, Guangdong Academy of Sciences, Guangzhou, China.
² Guizhou Provincial Key Laboratory for Agricultural Pest Management of the Mountainous Region, Scientific Observing and Experimental Station of Crop Pest in Guiyang, Institute of Entomology, Ministry of Agriculture, Guizhou University, Guiyang, China.
³ Institute of Molecular Biology and Biotechnology, The University of Lahore, Lahore, Pakistan.
⁴ Honeybee Research Institute, National Agricultural Research Centre, Islamabad, Pakistan.
⁵ Department of Entomology and Wildlife Ecology, University of Delaware, Newark, DE, United States.

Abstract

Maize is an essential crop of China. The recent invasion of Spodoptera frugiperda, also known as fall armyworm (FAW), poses a danger to the country's ability to maintain a sustainable level of productivity from this core crop. Entomopathogenic fungi (EPF) Metarhizium anisopliae MA, Penicillium citrinum CTD-28 and CTD-2, Cladosporium sp. BM-8, Aspergillus sp. SE-25 and SE-5, Metarhizium sp. CA-7, and Syncephalastrum racemosum SR-23 were tested to determine their effectiveness in causing mortality in second instars, eggs, and neonate larvae. Metarhizium anisopliae MA, P. citrinum CTD-28, and Cladosporium sp. BM-8 caused the highest levels of egg mortality, with 86.0, 75.3, and 70.0%, respectively, followed by Penicillium sp. CTD-2 (60.0%). Additionally, M. anisopliae MA caused the highest neonatal mortality of 57.1%, followed by P. citrinum CTD-28 (40.7%). In addition, M. anisopliae MA, P. citrinum CTD-28, and Penicillium sp. CTD-2 decreased the feeding efficacy of second instar larvae of FAW by 77.8, 75.0, and 68.1%, respectively, followed by Cladosporium sp. BM-8 (59.7%). It is possible that EPF will play an important role as microbial agents against FAW after further research is conducted on the effectiveness of these EPF in the field.

Keywords: egg mortality; entomopathogenic fungi; fall army worm; feeding performance; neonate mortality.

Grants and funding

This research work was financially supported by the Key-Area Research and Development Program of Guangdong Province (No. 2020B020223004), GDAS Special Project of Science and Technology Development (Nos. 2020GDASYL-20200301003 and 2020GDASYL-20200104025), GDAS Action Capital Project to build a comprehensive industrial technology innovation Center (No. 2022GDASZH-2022010106).