Publications by authors named "Shouke Zhang"

Article Synopsis
  • Bamboo snout moths, significant pests of bamboo in tropical and subtropical areas, include four species that have lacked sufficient genetic data for effective identification and management.
  • This study sequenced the complete mitochondrial genomes of these species, revealing their consistent genetic structure with 13 protein-coding genes, 22 tRNA genes, and other elements, aiding in further classification.
  • Phylogenetic analyses indicated that the moths clustered together based on their bamboo diet, suggesting a close evolutionary relationship with their host plants, which can inform better pest control strategies.
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Article Synopsis
  • Anthracnose is a fungal disease threatening fruit trees and crops, with traditional pesticides causing environmental and resistance issues.
  • A new strategy combining low-toxicity chemicals (validamycin A) and biopesticides (TCS001) significantly enhances disease control, showing a 65.62% greater antifungal effect when used together.
  • The treatment not only caused deformities in the pathogen but also improved the disease resistance of treated plants by increasing polyphenol oxidase levels by 161.72%, contributing to sustainable agriculture practices.
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Background: The plant secondary metabolites (PSMs), as important plant resistance indicators, are important targets for screening plant insect resistance breeding. In this study, we aimed to investigate whether the population of (ZC) is affected by different varieties of PSMs content. At the same time, the structure and function of the gut microbiome of ZC were also analyzed in relation to different pecan varieties.

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Gut microbiota are important in the adaptation of phytophagous insects to their plant hosts. However, the interaction between gut microbiomes and pioneering populations of invasive insects during their adaptation to new hosts, particularly in the initial phases of invasion, has been less studied. We studied the contribution of the gut microbiome to host adaptation in the globally recognized invasive pest, Hyphantria cunea, as it expands its range into southern China.

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The gut microbiota serves as a critical "organ" in the life cycle of animals, particularly in the intricate interplay between herbivorous pests and plants. This review summarizes the pivotal functions of the gut microbiota in mediating the insect-plant interactions, encompassing their influence on host insects, modulation of plant physiology, and regulation of the third trophic level species within the ecological network. Given these significant functions, it is plausible to harness these interactions and their underlying mechanisms to develop novel eco-friendly pest control strategies.

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Plant invasions significantly alter the microbiome of the soil in terms of fungal and bacterial communities, which in turn regulates ecosystem processes and nutrient dynamics. However, it is unclear how soil microbial communities, nitrogen (N) mineralization, and their linkages respond to plant invasions over the growing season in forest ecosystems. The present study investigated the seasonal associations between the microbial composition/function and net N mineralization in evergreen broadleaf, mixed bamboo-broadleaf, and Moso bamboo (Phyllostachys edulis) forests, depicting uninvaded, moderately invaded, and heavily invaded forests, respectively.

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Beneficial gut bacteria can enhance herbivorous arthropod adaptation to plant secondary compounds (PSMs), and specialist herbivores provide excellent examples of this. Tea saponin (TS) of is triterpenoids toxic to seed-feeding weevil pest, (CW). Previous studies disclosed that Acinetobacter, which was specific enriched in the CW's gut, was involved in helping CW evade TS toxicity of .

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Fast-growing bamboo may be a source of high-quality cellulose with the potential to contribute to energy sustainability, if an efficient and low-cost solution to bamboo cellulose decomposition can be developed. This study compared the gut microbiomes of rhinoceros beetle () feeding on bamboo and wood fiber. The results revealed that diet has a distinctive effect on microbial composition in the midgut, including its most abundant microorganisms that in the fermentation and chemoheterotroph pathways.

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Background: Herbivorous insects acquire their gut microbiota from diverse sources, and these microorganisms play significant roles in insect hosts' tolerance to plant secondary defensive compounds. Camellia weevil (Curculio chinensis) (CW) is an obligate seed parasite of Camellia oleifera plants. Our previous study linked the CW's gut microbiome to the tolerance of the tea saponin (TS) in C.

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Nitrogen enters the terrestrial ecosystem through deposition. High nitrogen levels can affect physical and chemical properties of soil and inhibit normal growth and reproduction of forest plants. Nitrogen modulates the composition of soil microorganisms.

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Switching to a new host plant is a driving force for divergence and speciation in herbivorous insects. This process of incorporating a novel host plant into the diet may require a number of adaptations in the insect herbivores that allow them to consume host plant tissue that may contain toxic secondary chemicals. As a result, herbivorous insects are predicted to have evolved efficient ways to detoxify major plant defences and increase fitness by either relying on their own genomes or by recruiting other organisms such as microbial gut symbionts.

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Plant secondary metabolites (PSMs) can affect the structures and functions of soil microbiomes. However, the core bacteria associated with PSMs, and their corresponding functions have not been explored extensively. In this study, soil physicochemical properties, tea saponin (TS) contents, microbial community compositions, and microbial community functions of different-age Camellia oleifera plantation soils from representative regions were analyzed.

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Article Synopsis
  • * The disease starts with dark green spots on the leaf tips that expand, turn yellow-brown, and eventually lead to brittle leaves that fall off, demonstrating significant impact on the plant's health.
  • * Researchers sampled infected leaves, isolated the pathogen using specific culture media, and characterized it morphologically, confirming it as a species of Colletotrichum, with DNA sequences deposited in GenBank for further study.
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The adaptability of herbivorous insects to toxic plant defense compounds is partly related to the structure of the gut microbiome. To overcome plant resistance, the insect gut microbiome should respond to a wide range of allelochemicals derived from dietary niches. Nevertheless, for sibling herbivorous insect species, whether the gut microbiome contributes to success in food niche competition is unclear.

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The gut microbiome plays an important role in a host's development and adaption to its dietary niche. In this study, a group of bamboo-feeding insects are used to explore the potential role of the gut microbiota in the convergent adaptation to extreme diet specialization. Specifically, using a 16S rRNA marker and an Illumina sequencing platform, we profiled the microbial communities of 76 gut samples collected from nine bamboo-feeding insects, including both hemimetabolous (Orthoptera and Hemiptera) and holometabolous (Coleoptera and Lepidoptera) species, which are specialized in three distinct dietary niches: bamboo leaf, shoot, and sap.

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The camellia weevil (CW []) is a notorious host-specific predator of the seeds of species in China, causing seed losses of up to 60%. The weevil is capable of overcoming host tree chemical defenses, while the mechanisms of how these beetles contend with the toxic compounds are still unknown. Here, we examined the interaction between the gut microbes of CW and camellia seed chemistry and found that beetle-associated bacterial symbionts mediate tea saponin degradation.

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Complete mitochondrial genomes contain large and diverse datasets for species delineation. To better understand the divergence of the two morphologically indistinguishable weevil species in Curculionini, we first sequenced and compared their complete mitochondrial genomes. The complete mitochondrial genomes of Curculio chinensis and Curculio sp.

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