title: Further enhancement of baculovirus insecticidal efficacy with scorpion toxins that interact cooperatively.
abstract: We have studied whether the cooperative insecticidal effect of certain scorpion toxin pairs, namely either a combination of excitatory and depressant, or alpha and depressant scorpion toxins, would improve the efficacy of Autographa californica nucleopolyhedrovirus (AcMNPV) over a virus expressing only a single toxin, towards Heliothis virescens, Helicoverpa armigera, and Spodoptera littoralis larvae. The best result was achieved by combined expression of the excitatory toxin, LqhIT1, and the depressant toxin, LqhIT2, that provided an ET(50) value of 46.9 h on H. virescens neonates, an improvement of 40% over the efficacy of wild-type AcMNPV, and of 18% and 22% over baculoviruses that express each of the toxins independently. These results demonstrate that significant improvement in efficacy of recombinant baculoviruses is obtainable with toxins that exhibit a cooperative effect, and may contribute to employ baculoviruses to replace hazardous chemicals in insect control.
authors.affiliation: Entomology Department, Institute of Plant Protection, ARO, The Volcani Center, P.O. Box 6, Bet Dagan 50250, Israel.
authors.forename: Avital
authors.initials: A
authors.lastname: Regev
authors.forename: Hadassah
authors.initials: H
authors.lastname: Rivkin
authors.forename: Bora
authors.initials: B
authors.lastname: Inceoglu
authors.forename: Eduard
authors.initials: E
authors.lastname: Gershburg
authors.forename: Bruce D
authors.initials: BD
authors.lastname: Hammock
authors.forename: Michael
authors.initials: M
authors.lastname: Gurevitz
authors.forename: Nor
authors.initials: N
authors.lastname: Chejanovsky
mesh_terms: D000818:Animals; D016367:Baculoviridae / Q000254:growth & development / Q000502:physiology*; D002460:Cell Line; D017924:Nucleopolyhedroviruses / Q000254:growth & development / Q000502:physiology*; D000077183:Occlusion Body Matrix Proteins; D012604:Scorpion Venoms / Q000737:chemistry / Q000235:genetics / Q000633:toxicity*; D018411:Spodoptera; D014764:Viral Proteins / Q000235:genetics; D015678:Viral Structural Proteins
chemical_list: D000077183:Occlusion Body Matrix Proteins; D012604:Scorpion Venoms; D014764:Viral Proteins; D015678:Viral Structural Proteins; C009829:polyhedrin protein, Nucleopolyhedrovirus