Collaborative Research: Insect herbivore feeding guilds and compartmentalized plant defense

合作研究：昆虫食草动物喂养协会和分区植物防御

• 批准号: 1907491
• 负责人: Anurag Agrawal
• 金额: $ 53.53万
• 依托单位: Cornell University
• 依托单位国家: 美国
• 项目类别: Standard Grant
• 财政年份: 2019
• 资助国家: 美国
• 起止时间: 2019-06-01 至 2023-05-31
• 项目状态: 已结题
• 来源: https://www.nsf.gov/awardsearch/showAward?AWD_ID=1907491&HistoricalAwards=false
• 关键词: Collaborative; Research; Insect; herbivore; feeding

Plants are the basic energy source in nearly all food chains and are responsible for feeding the world. Yet over the eons, tremendous insect pressure on plants has led to the evolution of a remarkable diversity of tactics to defend against being consumed. Plants defend with toxins, spines, and sticky sap. Despite demonstrations of how plant traits can reduce herbivory, in most wild plant systems scientists lack an understanding of the mechanisms of plant defensive responses. Do plants make specific toxins targeted at root feeders versus leaf feeders, all the while not poisoning beneficial visitors such as pollinators? Deciphering the mechanisms of plant defense not only advances scientific knowledge of ecology and evolution but may have important societal benefits. Because wild plants have been engaged in a long-term evolutionary battle with insect pests, studying the mechanisms of defense may enhance crop pest management. This project focuses on milkweeds, which are the only host for the declining monarch butterfly. Basic knowledge of the interaction between monarchs and milkweed will be gained, which could help sustain the monarch's threatened migration. This project blends the latest advances in genomic manipulation, toxicology and chemistry in a way that will train scientists to meld natural history and important ecological problems. The investigators will expand their communication to the public through schools, presentations, and a blog.Little is known about how plant defenses are aimed at different attackers, whether there are trade-offs associated with multiple arms races, and whether tissue-specific phenotypic plasticity is a means to manage interactions with several pests. This work uses milkweeds as a model natural system with well-characterized defense chemistry to test the specificity and interdependence of interactions with diverse insect attackers that include leaf-feeding monarch butterflies, root-feeding beetles, and seed-feeding bugs. From the plant's perspective, trade-offs will be evaluated between multiple defenses and their non-target impacts on pollinating bumblebees as costs associated with constitutive or induced defenses. From the herbivores' perspective, assays of plant toxin expression will be coupled to impacts on insect target site enzymatic function, behavior, and whole-organism performance. Beyond guild-specific plant defense and trade-off hypotheses, classic explanations for diversity in plant defense will also be tested: the non-exclusive hypotheses that (i) naturally occurring toxin mixtures are differentially expressed in plant parts and (ii) mixtures are more effective than equal doses of single compounds. This view on specialization and interaction addresses the dynamic match in offense-defense traits that may generate diversity within plants and insects through distinct arms races occurring from roots to fruits. Feeding trials will be used to address how single cardenolides and natural mixtures impact physiological function, insect behavior, sequestration, and fitness. By extracting the Na/K-ATPase (the target of cardenolides) from the different insects, the specific action of toxins will also be assessed in vitro.This award reflects NSF's statutory mission and has been deemed worthy of support through evaluation using the Foundation's intellectual merit and broader impacts review criteria.

植物几乎是所有食物链中的基本能源，并负责养活世界。 然而，在eons上，植物上的巨大昆虫压力导致了一种显着的战术多样性，以防止被消耗掉。植物用毒素，刺和粘稠的汁液防御。尽管证明了植物特征如何减少草食性，但在大多数野生植物系统中，科学家都缺乏对植物防御反应机制的理解。植物是否将特定的毒素靶向根喂食器与叶子喂食器，而同时又不毒害有益的访客，例如传粉媒介？ 破译植物防御的机制不仅可以提高生态和进化的科学知识，而且可能具有重要的社会利益。由于野生植物已经与害虫进行了长期的进化战斗，因此研究防御机制可能会增强作物害虫的管理。该项目的重点是乳草，这是君主蝴蝶下降的唯一主机。 将获得有关君主与乳草之间相互作用的基本知识，这将有助于维持君主的威胁移民。 该项目融合了基因组操纵，毒理学和化学方面的最新进展，该方法将培训科学家融合自然史和重要的生态问题。 调查人员将通过学校，演讲和博客扩大与公众的沟通。关于植物防御如何针对不同攻击者的知识，是否存在与多个武器竞赛相关的权衡，以及组织特异性的表型可塑性是否是管理与多种pests互动的一种手段。这项工作使用乳草作为模型自然系统，具有良好的防御化学化学，以测试与多种昆虫攻击者相互作用的特异性和相互依存关系，包括叶喂食君主蝴蝶，喂食甲虫和种子喂养虫子。从工厂的角度来看，将评估多种防御及其对授粉大黄蜂的非目标影响之间的权衡，这是与本构或诱导防御剂有关的成本。从草食动物的角度来看，对植物毒素表达的测定将与对昆虫靶位点酶促功能，行为和全生物性能的影响相结合。除了公会特异性的植物防御和权衡假设之外，还将测试对植物防御多样性的经典解释：（i）（i）自然存在的毒素混合物在植物零件中差异表达，并且（ii）混合物比同等剂量的单个化合物更有效。这种关于专业化和互动的观点探讨了进攻性特征的动态匹配，这些特征可能通过从根部到水果发生的不同的武器种族在植物和昆虫中产生多样性。喂养试验将用于解决单一的心脏混合物和自然混合物如何影响生理功能，昆虫行为，隔离和适应性。通过从不同昆虫中提取Na/k-ATPase（心脏脱氧核心的靶标），还将在体外评估毒素的具体作用。该奖项反映了NSF的法定任务，并被认为是值得通过基金会的知识分子优点和更广泛影响的审查标准通过评估来进行评估的。

项目成果

Host specificity and variation in oviposition behaviour of milkweed stem weevils and implications for species divergence

马利筋茎象甲的寄主特异性和产卵行为的变化及其对物种分化的影响

• DOI: 10.1111/een.12899
• 发表时间: 2020
• 期刊: Ecological Entomology
• 影响因子: 2.2
• 作者: Arcila Hernández, Lina M.;Davis, Steven R.;Agrawal, Anurag A.
• 通讯作者: Agrawal, Anurag A.

Evolution of shade tolerance is associated with attenuation of shade avoidance and reduced phenotypic plasticity in North American milkweeds

北美马利筋耐荫性的进化与避荫能力的减弱和表型可塑性的降低有关

• DOI: 10.1002/ajb2.1732
• 发表时间: 2021
• 期刊: American Journal of Botany
• 影响因子: 3
• 作者: Coverdale, Tyler C.;Agrawal, Anurag A.
• 通讯作者: Agrawal, Anurag A.

Ecological Interactions, Environmental Gradients, and Gene Flow in Local Adaptation

• DOI: 10.1016/j.tplants.2021.03.006
• 发表时间: 2021-07-14
• 期刊: TRENDS IN PLANT SCIENCE
• 影响因子: 20.5
• 作者: Lopez-Goldar, Xose;Agrawal, Anurag A.
• 通讯作者: Agrawal, Anurag A.

Plant Defense by Latex: Ecological Genetics of Inducibility in the Milkweeds and a General Review of Mechanisms, Evolution, and Implications for Agriculture

• DOI: 10.1007/s10886-019-01119-8
• 发表时间: 2019-11-21
• 期刊: JOURNAL OF CHEMICAL ECOLOGY
• 影响因子: 2.3
• 作者: Agrawal, Anurag A.;Hastings, Amy P.
• 通讯作者: Hastings, Amy P.

The evolution of coevolution in the study of species interactions

• DOI: 10.1111/evo.14293
• 发表时间: 2021-07-05
• 期刊: EVOLUTION
• 影响因子: 3.3
• 作者: Agrawal, Anurag A.;Zhang, Xuening
• 通讯作者: Zhang, Xuening