Immune modulation enables a specialist insect to benefit from antibacterial withanolides in its host plant

Andrea Barthel, Heiko Vogel, Yannick Pauchet, Gerhard Pauls, Grit Kunert, Astrid T. Groot, Wilhelm Boland, David G. Heckel and Hanna M. Heidel-Fischer ()
Additional contact information
Andrea Barthel: Max Planck Institute for Chemical Ecology
Heiko Vogel: Max Planck Institute for Chemical Ecology
Yannick Pauchet: Max Planck Institute for Chemical Ecology
Gerhard Pauls: Max Planck Institute for Chemical Ecology
Grit Kunert: Max Planck Institute for Chemical Ecology
Astrid T. Groot: Max Planck Institute for Chemical Ecology
Wilhelm Boland: Max Planck Institute for Chemical Ecology
David G. Heckel: Max Planck Institute for Chemical Ecology
Hanna M. Heidel-Fischer: Max Planck Institute for Chemical Ecology

Nature Communications, 2016, vol. 7, issue 1, 1-11

Abstract: Abstract The development of novel plant chemical defenses and counter adaptations by herbivorous insect could continually drive speciation, producing more insect specialists than generalists. One approach to test this hypothesis is to compare closely related generalist and specialist species to reveal the associated costs and benefits of these different adaptive strategies. We use the specialized moth Heliothis subflexa, which feeds exclusively on plants in the genus Physalis, and its close generalist relative H. virescens. Specialization on Physalis plants necessitates the ability to tolerate withanolides, the secondary metabolites of Physalis species that are known to have feeding deterrent and immune inhibiting properties for other insects. Here we find that only H. subflexa benefits from the antibacterial properties of withanolides, and thereby gains a higher tolerance of the pathogen Bacillus thuringiensis. We argue that the specialization in H. subflexa has been guided to a large extent by a unique role of plant chemistry on ecological immunology.

Date: 2016
References: Add references at CitEc
Citations:

Downloads: (external link)
https://www.nature.com/articles/ncomms12530 Abstract (text/html)

Related works:
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:nat:natcom:v:7:y:2016:i:1:d:10.1038_ncomms12530

Ordering information: This journal article can be ordered from
https://www.nature.com/ncomms/

DOI: 10.1038/ncomms12530

Access Statistics for this article

Nature Communications is currently edited by Nathalie Le Bot, Enda Bergin and Fiona Gillespie

More articles in Nature Communications from Nature
Bibliographic data for series maintained by Sonal Shukla () and Springer Nature Abstracting and Indexing ().