Microbial management of arthropod pests of tea: current state and prospects

Abstract

Sustainable tea cultivation will rely increasingly on alternatives to conventional chemical insecticides for pest management that are environment-friendly and reduce the amount of pesticide residues in made tea. Entomopathogens can provide effective control, conserve biodiversity, and serve as alternatives to chemical insecticides under several conditions. Due to their specificity for insects, these pathogens including viruses, bacteria, and fungi are ideal candidates for incorporation in the integrated pest management strategies for tea where their effects on other natural enemies will be minimal. Biological and ecological characteristics of several dominant natural entomopathogenic microorganisms have been well documented throughout the tea-growing countries particularly China, Japan, and India. But research to convert them to microbial insecticide formulations for tea pest control by evolving suitable techniques for production, standardization, formulation, and application has not progressed well except in Japan and China to some extent. Increased use of microbial control will depend on a variety of factors including improvements in the pathogens' virulence, formulation, delivery, etc. and an increased awareness of their attributes by growers and the general public. In this review, we provide an overview of microbial control of the key insect pests of tea and also the scope for future studies for their better utilization.

De novo Transcriptome Assembly of Myllocerinus aurolineatus Voss in Tea Plants

“…Many nutritional ingredients are produced in tea shoots, which are used as raw materials for commercial tea processing (Comblain et al, 2016). However, various tea plant pests jeopardize the quantity and quality of tea, such as the tea leaf beetle, one of the most serious pests affecting tea plants in China, Vietnam, Indonesia, Japan, and other teaproducing countries in Asia (Sun et al, 2010;Yang et al, 2013;Roy and Muraleedharan, 2014). Here, we reported a leaf beetle, Myllocerinus aurolineatus Voss in tea plant in Guizhou province, China.…”

Potentiality of actinobacteria to combat against biotic and abiotic stresses in tea [Camellia sinensis (L) O. Kuntze]

“…depends on the geographic region although several species are observed in more than one region (Roy et al, 2016). It is estimated that more than 1031 species of arthropods and 82 species of nematodes infest tea all over the world (Hazarika et al, 2009) and 380 species of phytophagous pests are reported from India alone (Roy & Muraleedharan, 2014). Some major tea pests are sucking pests, like tea mosquito bug ( Helopeltis theivora ), tea thrips ( Scirtothrips dorsalis ), chewing pests like looper caterpillar ( Buzura suppressaria ), red slug caterpillar ( Eterusia magnifica ) and mite pest, such as scarlet mite ( Brevipalpus phoenicis ), red spider mite ( Oligonychus coffeae ).…”

Label-free, non-invasive light scattering sensor for rapid screening of Bacillus colonies

“…The bacterial species within the genus Bacillus has broad significance; they produce industrially beneficial enzymes (Liszka et al, 2012), bacteriocins and antibiotics (Abriouel et al, 2011), insecticides (Bravo et al, 2013;Roy and Muraleedharan, 2014), and used as probiotics (Cutting, 2011). They are also responsible for food spoilage and human and animal diseases (Logan, 2012).…”