Sorghum cuticular waxes influence host plant selection by aphids

Main conclusion Quantification of cuticular waxes coupled with insect bioassays and feeding behavior analysis demonstrate that long-chain C-32 fatty alcohol impacts host plant selection by aphids. Cuticular waxes constitute the first point of contact between plants and their environment, and it also protect plants from external stresses. However, the role of waxes in Sorghum bicolor (sorghum) against sugarcane aphid (Melanaphis sacchari), a relatively new and devastating pest of sorghum in the U.S., is not fully understood. In this study, we monitored sugarcane aphid behavior on two genotypes of young sorghum plants with different wax chemistry: a wild-type plant (bloom) with lower C-32 alcohol cuticular wax, and a mutant plant (bloomless) with 1.6 times the amount of wax compared to wild-type plants. No-choice aphid bioassays revealed that sugarcane aphid reproduction did not vary between wild-type and the bloomless plants. Electrical Penetration Graph (EPG) monitoring indicated that the sugarcane aphids spent comparable amount of time feeding from the sieve elements of the wild-type and bloomless plants. However, aphids spent more time feeding on the xylem sap of the bloomless plants compared to the wild-type plants. Furthermore, aphid choice assays revealed that the sugarcane aphids preferred to settle on bloomless compared to wild-type plants. Overall, our results suggest that cuticular waxes on young sorghum leaves play a critical role in influencing host plant selection by sugarcane aphids.

Automated summary

Quantification of cuticular waxes coupled with insect bioassays and feeding behavior analysis demonstrate that long-chain C-32 fatty alcohol impacts host plant selection by aphids. The study found that the reproduction and feeding behavior of sugarcane aphids were not significantly affected by the presence of aromatic plants compared to wild-type plants. However, the Electrical Penetration Graph (EPG) monitoring results showed that aphids preferentially fed on the xylem sap of aromatic plants, suggesting a critical role of cuticular waxes in influencing host plant selection by aphids.