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Lessons from the Far End: Caterpillar FRASS-Induced Defenses in Maize, Rice, Cabbage, and Tomato

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Abstract

Plant defenses to insect herbivores have been studied in response to several insect behaviors on plants such as feeding, crawling, and oviposition. However, we have only scratched the surface about how insect feces induce plant defenses. In this study, we measured frass-induced plant defenses in maize, rice, cabbage, and tomato by chewing herbivores such as European corn borer (ECB), fall armyworm (FAW), cabbage looper (CL), and tomato fruit worm (TFW). We observed that caterpillar frass induced plant defenses are specific to each host-herbivore system, and they may induce herbivore or pathogen defense responses in the host plant depending on the composition of the frass deposited on the plant, the plant organ where it is deposited, and the species of insect. This study adds another layer of complexity in plant-insect interactions where analysis of frass-induced defenses has been neglected even in host-herbivore systems where naturally frass accumulates in enclosed feeding sites over extended periods of time.

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Acknowledgments

The author acknowledges Dr. Kelli Hoover’s lab for their help in quantifying RNA samples with Nanodrop (Thermo Fisher Scientific). The author thanks Michelle Peiffer for the tomato seeds, primers for tomato and Ching-Wen Tan for providing the eggs of tomato fruitworm larva.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Intercollegiate Graduate Program in Plant Biology, Huck Institute of Life Sciences, Pennsylvania State University, University Park, PA, USA

    Swayamjit Ray & Dawn S. Luthe

  2. Department of Plant Science, Pennsylvania State University, University Park, PA, USA

    Swayamjit Ray & Dawn S. Luthe

  3. Department of Entomology, University of Nebraska-Lincoln, Lincoln, NE, USA

    Saumik Basu & Joe Louis

  4. Department of Entomology, Pennsylvania State University, University Park, PA, USA

    Loren J. Rivera-Vega, Flor E. Acevedo & Gary W. Felton

Authors
  1. Swayamjit Ray
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  2. Saumik Basu
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  3. Loren J. Rivera-Vega
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  4. Flor E. Acevedo
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  5. Joe Louis
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  6. Gary W. Felton
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  7. Dawn S. Luthe
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Corresponding author

Correspondence to Dawn S. Luthe.

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Funding

This work was supported by grants from USDA NIFA (2010–65,105-20,639 and 2011–67,013-30,352) awarded to D.S. L and G.W. F; NSF (IOS-1,256,326) awarded to G.W.F. and start-up funds of J.L. at University of Nebraska-Lincoln.

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Ray, S., Basu, S., Rivera-Vega, L.J. et al. Lessons from the Far End: Caterpillar FRASS-Induced Defenses in Maize, Rice, Cabbage, and Tomato. J Chem Ecol 42, 1130–1141 (2016). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10886-016-0776-x

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s10886-016-0776-x

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