TY - JOUR
T1 - Knock down of whitefly gut gene expression and mortality by orally delivered gut gene-specific dsRNAs
AU - Vyas, Meenal
AU - Raza, Amir
AU - Ali, Muhammad Yousaf
AU - Ashraf, Muhammad Aleem
AU - Mansoor, Shahid
AU - Shahid, Ahmad Ali
AU - Brown, Judith K.
N1 - Funding Information: The authors gratefully acknowledge funding received from the Higher Education Commission of Pakistan-International Research Support Initiative Program that provided financial support to the visiting Ph.D. scholars, AR, MYA and MAA, and to the USDA-University of Arizona-Pakistan Project 6402-21310-003-10S, ‘Development of Cotton leaf curl virus diagnostic tools for monitoring CLCuV in Pakistan’ that provided partial support to MV. Publisher Copyright: © 2017 Vyas et al. This is an open access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License, which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original author and source are credited.
PY - 2017/1
Y1 - 2017/1
N2 - Control of the whitefly Bemisia tabaci (Genn.) agricultural pest and plant virus vector relies on the use of chemical insecticides. RNA-interference (RNAi) is a homology-dependent innate immune response in eukaryotes, including insects, which results in degradation of the corresponding transcript following its recognition by a double-stranded RNA (dsRNA) that shares 100% sequence homology. In this study, six whitefly 'gut' genes were selected from an in silico-annotated transcriptome library constructed from the whitefly alimentary canal or 'gut' of the B biotype of B. tabaci, and tested for knock down efficacy, post-ingestion of dsRNAs that share 100% sequence homology to each respective gene target. Candidate genes were: Acetylcholine receptor subunit α, Alpha glucosidase 1, Aquaporin 1, Heat shock protein 70, Trehalase1, and Trehalose transporter1. The efficacy of RNAi knock down was further tested in a gene-specific functional bioassay, and mortality was recorded in 24 hr intervals, six days, post-treatment. Based on qPCR analysis, all six genes tested showed significantly reduced gene expression. Moderate-to-high whitefly mortality was associated with the down-regulation of osmoregulation, sugar metabolism and sugar transport-associated genes, demonstrating that whitefly survivability was linked with RNAi results. Silenced Acetylcholine receptor subunit α and Heat shock protein 70 genes showed an initial low whitefly mortality, however, following insecticide or high temperature treatments, respectively, significantly increased knockdown efficacy and death was observed, indicating enhanced post-knockdown sensitivity perhaps related to systemic silencing. The oral delivery of gut-specific dsRNAs, when combined with qPCR analysis of gene expression and a corresponding gene-specific bioassay that relates knockdown and mortality, offers a viable approach for functional genomics analysis and the discovery of prospective dsRNA biopesticide targets. The approach can be applied to functional genomics analyses to facilitate, species-specific dsRNA-mediated control of other non-model hemipterans.
AB - Control of the whitefly Bemisia tabaci (Genn.) agricultural pest and plant virus vector relies on the use of chemical insecticides. RNA-interference (RNAi) is a homology-dependent innate immune response in eukaryotes, including insects, which results in degradation of the corresponding transcript following its recognition by a double-stranded RNA (dsRNA) that shares 100% sequence homology. In this study, six whitefly 'gut' genes were selected from an in silico-annotated transcriptome library constructed from the whitefly alimentary canal or 'gut' of the B biotype of B. tabaci, and tested for knock down efficacy, post-ingestion of dsRNAs that share 100% sequence homology to each respective gene target. Candidate genes were: Acetylcholine receptor subunit α, Alpha glucosidase 1, Aquaporin 1, Heat shock protein 70, Trehalase1, and Trehalose transporter1. The efficacy of RNAi knock down was further tested in a gene-specific functional bioassay, and mortality was recorded in 24 hr intervals, six days, post-treatment. Based on qPCR analysis, all six genes tested showed significantly reduced gene expression. Moderate-to-high whitefly mortality was associated with the down-regulation of osmoregulation, sugar metabolism and sugar transport-associated genes, demonstrating that whitefly survivability was linked with RNAi results. Silenced Acetylcholine receptor subunit α and Heat shock protein 70 genes showed an initial low whitefly mortality, however, following insecticide or high temperature treatments, respectively, significantly increased knockdown efficacy and death was observed, indicating enhanced post-knockdown sensitivity perhaps related to systemic silencing. The oral delivery of gut-specific dsRNAs, when combined with qPCR analysis of gene expression and a corresponding gene-specific bioassay that relates knockdown and mortality, offers a viable approach for functional genomics analysis and the discovery of prospective dsRNA biopesticide targets. The approach can be applied to functional genomics analyses to facilitate, species-specific dsRNA-mediated control of other non-model hemipterans.
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U2 - 10.1371/journal.pone.0168921
DO - 10.1371/journal.pone.0168921
M3 - Article
C2 - 28045942
SN - 1932-6203
VL - 12
JO - PloS one
JF - PloS one
IS - 1
M1 - e0168921
ER -