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Pathogenicity of Beauveria bassiana isolated from Moroccan Argan forests soil against larvae of Ceratitis capitata (Diptera: Tephritidae) in laboratory conditions

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Abstract

The Mediterranean fruit fly, Ceratitis capitata Wiedemann (Diptera: Tephritidae), is the major tephritid pest in Morocco. This pest survives in Moroccan forests Argania spinosa and continually invades the nearest agricultural areas. Entomopathogenic fungi are an interesting tool for fruit fly control and hold a useful alternative to conventional insecticides. However, primary selection of effective pathogens should be taken in laboratory condition prior to applying them in the field. Here, we used third late instar larvae of C. capitata to investigate the effectiveness of 15 local Beauveria bassiana isolates. Results showed that all isolates were able to infect the larval stage, producing a large mortality rate in puparia ranging from 65 to 95 % and caused significant reduction in adult emergence. The fungal treatments revealed that the mycosis occurred also in adults escaping infection as pupariating larvae. The percentage of mycosed puparia was highest in strain TAM6.2 (95 %) followed by ERS4.16 (90 %), therefore they were the most virulent. Median lethal concentration (LC50) was studied for five isolates at four concentrations ranging from 105 to 108 conidia ml−1. The results showed that the slopes of regression lines for B. bassiana ERS4.16 (slope = 0.386) and TAM6.2 (slope = 0.41) were the most important and had the lowest LC50 values (2.85 × 103 and 3.16 × 103 conidia ml−1 respectively). This investigation suggests that the soil of Argan forests contains pathogenic B. bassiana isolates and highlights for the first time their potential as biological control toward C. capitata larval stage in Morocco.

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Acknowledgments

This work was financially supported by PROTARS II grant (P51/02) from the Moroccan Ministry of Higher Education and Scientific Research. A. Imoulan wishes to acknowledge CNRST for Doctorate research fellowship (b3/018).

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  1. Laboratory of Biotechnology, Valorization and Protection of Agro-Resources, Faculty of Science and Technics, Cadi-Ayyad University, Av. Abdelkarim EL Khattabi, B.P. 549, Marrakech, Morocco

    Abdessamad Imoulan & Abdellatif Elmeziane

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  1. Abdessamad Imoulan
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  2. Abdellatif Elmeziane
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Correspondence to Abdessamad Imoulan.

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Imoulan, A., Elmeziane, A. Pathogenicity of Beauveria bassiana isolated from Moroccan Argan forests soil against larvae of Ceratitis capitata (Diptera: Tephritidae) in laboratory conditions. World J Microbiol Biotechnol 30, 959–965 (2014). https://doi.org/10.1007/s11274-013-1514-y

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