The relationship between parasitoid wasps and polydnaviruses constitutes one of the few known mutualisms between viruses and eukaryotes. Viral particles are injected with the wasp eggs into parasitized larvae, and the viral genes thus introduced are used to manipulate lepidopteran host physiology. The genome packaged in the particles is composed of 35 double-stranded DNA (dsDNA) circles produce...

A new genus and species of parasitoid wasp is described from Burmese amber: Prototeleia kleio gen. nov. , sp. (Platygastroidea, Platygastridae). exhibits multiple characters that we consider to be plesiomorphic for Platygastridae. These are analyzed discussed in the context extant fossil taxa.

in order to evaluate the efficiency of biocontrol agents of corn stem borer ,ostrinia nubilalis, experiment was conducted in a randomized complete block by five treatments and four replication, including, indoxacarb (avant)®, trichogrammawasps, bacillus thuringiensis var: kurstaki, integration of trichogramma sp. and bt., and control as treatments number 1 to 5. in treatments with parasitoid re...

Communities of insect herbivores and their natural enemies are rich and ecologically crucial components of terrestrial biodiversity. Understanding the processes that promote their origin and maintenance is thus of considerable interest. One major proposed mechanism is ecological speciation through host-associated differentiation (HAD), the divergence of a polyphagous species first into ecologic...

In this paper, we analyze the polymorphisms of parasitoid wasp polydnavirus. The polydnavius genome is normally dormant within the genome of the wasp, but is converted into particles that are injected into the infected host along with the wasp eggs. These particles contain genes which inhibit the immune system of the infected host, and are necessary for the eggs to mature. Within a population, ...

Antagonistic relationships between parasitoids and their insect hosts involve multiple traits and are shaped by their ecological and evolutionary context. The parasitoid wasp Cotesia melitaearum and its host butterfly Melitaea cinxia occur in several locations around the Baltic sea, with differences in landscape structure, population sizes and the histories of the populations. We compared the v...

Females of the parasitoid wasp Trichogramma turkestanica produce the putative polydeoxypropionates (2E,4E,6S,8S,10S)-4,6,8,10-tetramethyltrideca-2,4-diene and (2E,4E,6S,8S,10S)-4,6,8,10-tetramethyltrideca-2,4-dien-1-ol or their enantiomers as sex specific volatiles. The structures were assigned on the basis of GC-MS investigations using synthetic reference compounds.