Modelling thermal reaction norms for development and viability in Drosophila suzukii under constant, fluctuating and field conditions.

Phenological models for insect pests often rely on knowledge of thermal reaction norms. These may differ in shape depending on developmental thermal conditions (e.g.

Modelling the impact of Apivar treatment on a Varroa mite population and the influence of resistance.

Background: Varroa destructor is a parasite of honeybees. It causes biological damage leading to the colony collapse in the absence of treatment. In recent years, acaricide resistance has emerged in Varroa mites, leading to a decrease in treatment efficacy.

When insect pests build their own thermal niche: The hot nest of the pine processionary moth.

Temperature strongly drives physiological and ecological processes in ectotherms. While many species rely on behavioural thermoregulation to avoid thermal extremes, others build structures (nests) that confer a shelter against climate variability and extremes. However, the microclimate inside nests remains unknown for most insects.

Inventory of Varroa destructor susceptibility to amitraz and tau-fluvalinate in France.

Varroa destructor is one of the greatest threats for the European honeybee, Apis mellifera. Acaricides are required to control mite infestation. Three conventional chemical acaricide substances are used in France: tau-fluvalinate, flumethrin and amitraz.

Bistability induced by generalist natural enemies can reverse pest invasions.

Analytical modeling of predator-prey systems has shown that specialist natural enemies can slow, stop and even reverse pest invasions, assuming that the prey population displays a strong Allee effect in its growth. We aimed to formalize the conditions in which spatial biological control can be achieved by generalists, through an analytical approach based on reaction-diffusion equations. Using comparison principles, we obtain sufficient conditions for control and for invasion, based on scalar bistable partial differential equations.

The Vulnerability of Tropical Ectotherms to Warming Is Modulated by the Microclimatic Heterogeneity.

Most tropical ectotherms live near their physiological limits for temperature. Substantial ecological effects of global change are predicted in the tropics despite the low amplitude of temperature change. These predictions assume that tropical ectotherms experience air temperature as measured by weather stations or predicted by global circulation models.

Impulsive spatial control of invading pests by generalist predators.

We model the conditions for pest eradication in a reaction-diffusion system made of a prey and a generalist predator through spatial impulsive control within a bounded domain. The motivating example is the control of the invasive horse chestnut leafminer moth through the yearly destruction of leaves in autumn, in which both the pest and its parasitoids overwinter. The model is made of two integro-partial differential equations, the integral portion describing the within-year immigration from the whole domain.