Beauveria bassiana infection alters colony development and defensive secretions of the beetles Tribolium castaneum and Ulomoides dermestoides (Coleoptera: Tenebrionidae).
We studied the effect of the entomopathogenic fungus Beauveria bassiana strain GHA on a) colony development of the beetles Tribolium castaneum (Herbst) and Ulomoides dermestoides (Fairmaire) (Coleoptera: Tenebrionidae) under laboratory conditions; and 2) the volatile blend released by both beetles, containing defensive pheromones, by using the solid phase microextraction technique. Colony development of both species was strongly altered 3 mo after treatment with B. bassiana, showing a significant reduction in progeny of 37.5% for T. castaneum and 50.0% for U. dermestoides. We also showed that the volatiles released by T. castaneum diminished close to 20% compared with those of healthy beetles, whereas in U. dermestoides secretions dramatically dropped to 5%, 7 d after immersion in 1 x 10(9) conidia per ml. These results suggest that after infection events take place, fungus-induced diminished secretion of the defensive pheromones may be a physiologic clue for behavioral changes in infected beetles.
Pedrini
N
N
Instituto de Investigaciones Bioquímicas de La Plata, CONICET, Facultad de Ciencias Médicas, UNLP, calles 60 y 120 (1900) La Plata, Argentina.
Villaverde
M L
ML
Fuse
C B
CB
Dal Bello
G M
GM
Juárez
M P
MP
D000818:Animals; D052982:Beauveria / Q000502:physiology*; D001522:Behavior, Animal; D001517:Coleoptera / Q000382:microbiology*; D034582:Integumentary System / Q000502:physiology; D013045:Species Specificity