Toxicity of E. coli Expressed Remusatia vivipara Lectin and Sclerotium rolfsii Lectin Delivered Via Artificial Diet Against Bemisia tabaci (Genn.) and Amrasca biguttula Biguttula (Ishida)

Whitefly (Bemisia tabaci) and green leaf hopper (Amrasca biguttula biguttula) are the most devastating crop pests worldwide. Their ability tocause direct damage by feeding on host and indirect damage by spreading the diseases has widest impact on global food production. They have widest host range and feeds on more than 600 plant species (Ahmed, et al., 2009). Due to indiscriminate use of insecticides, they have developed high levels of resistance to conventional insecticides (Chalam, et al., 2001; Prasad, et al., 1993). However, the levels of resistance to these sucking pests in the cultivated germplasm of several crops are low to moderate. Therefore, improving plant resistance to pests through genetic engineering has raised hopes of using plant resistance as an effective weapon for pest management (Sharma, et al., 2004). This includes RNA interference (RNAi) and incorporation of novel genes such as lectins, ribosome-inactivating proteins, protease inhibitors, á-amylase inhibitors, arcelin, canatoxin-like protein, ureases and chitinases (Carlini, et al., 2002; Vasconcelos, et al., 2004; Katoch, et al., ý2013). Bt-Cry proteins has emerged powerful tool of plant protection against lepidopteran and coleopteran insects, there is an urgent need to identify the novel insecticidal genes to confer resistance against homopteran insects (Hilder, and Boulter, 1999). Therefore, we evaluated the biological activity of a plant and fungal lectin as candidate genes for conferring resistance to B. tabaci and A. bigutulla bigutulla.