The progeny production from a single Myzus persicae was dependent on aphid density on Arabidopsis thaliana’s foliage

Abstract

Abstract A rapid colony formation on crop foliage is a highly relevant issue on agricultural and horticultural yield loss. Arabidopsis thaliana-Myzus persicae interaction model was explored for monitoring of the progeny production from a single aphid from an elevated level of an initial aphid densities like five, ten and twenty aphids’ release. The hypothesis was that each aphid contributed an equal number of progenies from every inoculum. The progeny production per aphid is also linked to host resistance and inversely corelated. To test this hypothesis, three different aphids’ density like five, ten and twenty adult aphids were inoculated with six biological replications on Arabidopsis thaliana foliage to monitor progeny proliferation from a single aphid in temporal scale like 0-, 12-, 24-, 36-, 60- and 108-hours’ time points after release. From the result, it was found that progeny contribution from a single aphid was dependent on aphid density on foliage. Another parameter, the marginal progeny production from a single aphid was also aphid density dependent. Thus, host resistance response was dependent on aphid density. In another perspective, aphids on host foliage were not independent, rather they communicated to each other through vascular sap. Therefore, the aphid density mediated herbivore on vascular sap was ‘footprinted’ in a density dependent manner and may be treated as molecular language among aphids.