Abstract
Kairomones are semiochemicals that are emitted by an organism and which mediate interspecific interaction that is of benefit to an organism of another species that receives these chemical substances. Parasitoids find and recognize their hosts through eavesdropping on the kairomones emitted from the by-products or the body of the host. Hemipteran insect pests feed on plant sap and excrete the digested plant materials as honeydew. Honeydew serves as a nutritional food source for parasitoids and a medium for micro-organisms whose activity induces the release of volatiles exploited by parasitoids for host location. The parasitoid Encarsia formosa preferentially parasitizes its host, the greenhouse whitefly, Trialeurodes vaporariorum, on tomato Solanum lycopersicum, but little is known about the chemicals that mediate these interactions. We investigated the olfactory responses of the parasitoid E. formosa to odours from honeydew and nymphs of T. vaporariorum in a Y-tube olfactometer. Arrestment behaviour of the parasitoid to honeydew and nymph extracts, as well as to synthetic hydrocarbons, was also observed in Petri-dish bioassays. We found that T. vaporariorum honeydew volatiles attracted the parasitoid E. formosa but odours from the whitefly nymphs did not. We also found that the parasitoid spent more time searching on areas treated with extracts of honeydew and nymphs than on untreated areas. Gas-chromatography-mass spectrometric analysis revealed that the honeydew volatiles contained compounds such as (Z)-3-hexenol, δ-3-carene, 3-octanone, α-phellandrene, methyl salicylate, β-ocimene, β-myrcene, and (E)-β-caryophyllene which are known to be attractive to E. formosa. The cuticular extracts of the nymphs predominantly contained alkanes, alkenes, and esters. Among the alkanes, synthetic nonacosane arrested the parasitoid. Our findings are discussed in relation to how the parasitoid E. formosa uses these chemicals to locate its host, T. vaporariorum.
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The authors acknowledge the financial support provided by the French National Research Agency (ANR) through CIRAD (Award no. ANR-16-CE32-0010-01); the National Research Foundation through the NRF grants of A.A.Y (IFRR Grant no. 109380 and Y-rated Researchers Grant no. RDYR180504326262) and C.W.W.P (Grant no. CPRR160502163617); and the bursary offered to P.M.A. by the University of Pretoria. We also gratefully acknowledge the following icipe core funding donors: the UK’s Foreign, Commonwealth & Development Office (FCDO); the Swedish International Development Cooperation Agency (SIDA); the Swiss Agency for Development and Cooperation (SDC); the Federal Democratic Republic of Ethiopia; and the Kenyan Government. P.M.A. was supported by the University of Pretoria and the Deutscher Akademischer Austauschdienst (DAAD) In-Region Postgraduate Scholarship (Personal Grant no. 91672680). The views expressed herein do not necessarily reflect the official opinion of the donors.
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Ayelo, P.M., Yusuf, A.A., Chailleux, A. et al. Chemical Cues From Honeydew and Cuticular Extracts of Trialeurodes Vaporariorum Serve as Kairomones for The Parasitoid Encarsia Formosa. J Chem Ecol 48, 370–383 (2022). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10886-022-01354-6
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s10886-022-01354-6