The Effect of Quercetin on the Growth, Development, Nutrition Utilization, and Detoxification Enzymes in Hyphantria cunea Drury (Lepidoptera: Arctiidae)

Abstract

Hyphantria cunea Drury (Lepidoptera: Arctiidae) is a worldwide quarantine pest that has a wide range of host plants. Quercetin is a secondary metabolite involved in chemical defense processes in plants. To understand how H. cunea adapt to quercetin in its host plants, we determined the effects of quercetin on larval mortality, growth, nutritional indices, and the activity or content of detoxification enzymes in H. cunea larvae by feeding them an artificial diet containing different concentrations of quercetin. Our results showed that 0.50% quercetin treatment significantly prolonged the development duration of H. cunea larvae and inhibited growth of H. cunea. Nutritional indices analysis indicated that quercetin significantly affected nutrient use, including effects on the approximate digestibility, consumption index, relative growth rate, and efficiency of conversion of ingested food to body substance. Furthermore, our results revealed that quercetin reduced the content of carboxylesterases, and increased the activity or content of glutathione S-transferases, UDP-glucuronosyltransferases, and ATP-binding cassette transporters in H. cunea larvae. These results provide a foundation for revealing the adaptation that H. cunea use to adapt to quercetin in host plants.