Etho-Metabolomics und Artvergleichsstudie zum Einfluss arbuskulärer Mykorrhizierung auf Entwicklung und Verhalten Spross-herbivorer Insekten und zugrunde liegende Mechanismen der Interaktionen

• Antragstellerin: Professorin Dr. Caroline Müller
• Fachliche Zuordnung: Ökologie und Biodiversität der Tiere und Ökosysteme, Organismische Interaktionen
• Förderung: Förderung von 2013 bis 2016
• Projektkennung: Deutsche Forschungsgemeinschaft (DFG) - Projektnummer 237974551

The food quality for herbivores is a direct function of the host plants metabolic composition. Herbivorous insects face a large variation in the suitability of their hosts due to different environmental factors affecting qualitative and quantitative properties of the plant metabolome. One factor that crucially impacts plant nutrition and tissue quality is the root symbiosis formed with arbuscular mycorrhizal fungi (AMF). The mycosymbionts provide plant hosts with mineral nutrients and water, receiving photoassimilates reciprocally. However, almost nothing is known on common and species-specific responses of metabolic, molecular and nutritional traits of the aerial plant tissues and specifically of the phloem upon AMF root colonisation and how these AM-mediated modifications affect the performance and particularly the behaviour of herbivorous insects. Therefore, we propose a comparative etho-metabolomics approach executing classical and metabolic plant phenotyping and molecular analyses coupled to insect bioassays and bioassay-guided fractionation applied across three mycotrophic plant (two Plantaginaceae, one Fabaceae) and four generalist herbivorous insect species (two Lepidoptera, two Homoptera). In detail, we target to uncover and understand the plasticity of performance and behaviour of herbivores with chewing vs. phloem-sucking feeding mode in relation to Rhizophagus intraradices-associated AM and non-mycorrhizal (NM) plants, respectively. In doing so, the aims of this study are I. to delineate general (useful as AM markers) from species-specific AM-mediated plant responses in leaf tissue and phloem, II. to investigate common effects of AM not only on herbivore performance but also on preferences and the overall behavioural phenotype of generalist insects feeding either on leaf tissue or phloem, and III. to isolate metabolites or metabolite blends that drive AM-associated modifications of insect performance and behaviour. Particular in Plantago major, the proposed experimental and analytic framework entails to study spatial and developmental dynamics of metabolite profiles and target compounds of leaf tissues and phloem and their impact on herbivore traits associated with different AM stages and colonisation intensities in more detail. Using this approach, a comprehensive picture of the mechanisms driving the systemic metabolic changes in plant material caused by AM and the common and specific consequences on the performance and behaviour of herbivores with different feeding modes will be established.

• DFG-Verfahren: Sachbeihilfen