Facultative endosymbionts can benefit insect hosts in a variety of ways, including context-dependent roles, such as providing defense against pathogens. The role of some symbionts in defense may be overlooked, however, when pathogen infection is transient, sporadic, or asymptomatic. The facultative endosymbiont Rickettsia increases the fitness of the sweet potato whitefly (Bemisia tabaci) in so...

Whiteflies (Hemiptera, Aleyrodidae) are represented by more than 1,500 herbivorous species around the world. Some of them are notorious pests of cassava (Manihot esculenta), a primary food crop in the tropics. Particularly destructive is a complex of Neotropical cassava whiteflies whose distribution remains restricted to their native range. Despite their importance, neither their distribution, ...

Background With some exceptions, mitochondria within the class Insecta have the same gene content, and generally, a similar gene order allowing the proposal of an ancestral gene order. The principal exceptions are several orders within the Hemipteroid assemblage including the order Thysanoptera, a sister group of the order Hemiptera. Within the Hemiptera, there are available a number of complet...

Our greenhouse tomatoes have suffered from attacks by viruliferous whiteflies Bemisia tabaci (Gennadius) (Hemiptera: Aleyrodidae) over the last 10 years. The fundamental countermeasure was the application of an electric field screen to the greenhouse windows to prevent their entry. However, while the protection was effective, it was incomplete, because of the lack of a guard at the greenhouse e...

Begomoviruses are transmitted by cryptic species of the whitefly Bemisia tabaci complex, often in a species-specific manner. Papaya leaf curl China virus (PaLCuCNV) has been recorded to infect several crops including papaya, tomato and tobacco in China. To help assess the risks of spread of this virus, we compared the acquisition, retention and transmission of PaLCuCNV among four species of whi...

Facultative bacterial endosymbionts are common, influential associates of arthropods, yet their movement among host species has not been well documented. Plant-mediated transmission of Rickettsia has been shown for the whitefly Bemisia tabaci. Bemisia tabaci in USA cotton fields harbors the secondary symbionts Rickettsia and Hamiltonella, and co-occurs with Trialeurodes sp. nr. abutiloneus whit...

Abstract Herbivores select host plants depending on plant quality and the presence of predators competitors. Competing herbivores change quantity through consumption, but they can also induction defences, this affects performance that arrive later plant. Some herbivores, such as spider mite Tetranychus evansi , do not induce, suppress later-arriving profit from suppression. It has been suggeste...

Plant viruses can produce direct and plant-mediated indirect effects on their insect vectors, modifying their life cycle, fitness and behavior. Viruses may benefit from such changes leading to enhanced transmission efficiency and spread. In our study, female adults of Bemisia tabaci were subjected to an acquisition access period of 72 h in Tomato yellow leaf curl virus (TYLCV)-infected and non-...