RNA interference protects potato plants against herbivore attack

Plant Research February 26, 2015

http://www.mpg.de/8990193/colorado-potato-beetle-RNA

Colorado potato beetle is one of the most destructive and hard to control insect pests due to its resistance against pesticides. Aside from pesticides, there are no other means of controlling the pest. An alternative control has been developed by researchers from Max Planck Institute. This was done by adopting the mechanism of RNA interference (RNAi) in protecting plant, fungi and insect against virus. The RNAi works by identifying the double stranded RNA transferred by the viral pathogen to host's cell and chopping this dsRNA into small interfering RNAs (siRNAS). siRNAs are then used to detect and destroy foreign RNA.

This RNAi mechanism has been employed by genetically engineering plants to modify their nuclear genome to produce dsRNA against insect pest. However, this was not too successful. Hence, the researchers developed transplastomic plants wherein the chloroplast genome is subject to modification instead of the nuclear genome. Feeding studies of potato beetle larvae with the leaves of transplastomic plants show that the leaves are lethal to the larvae and gain an increase resistance against herbivores. This finding provides an alternative way in fighting Colorado potato beetle without the use of any chemical pesticides.

Details of the study can be read at Max Planck Institute website and Science Magazine website.