The Asian citrus psyllid (ACP), Diaphorina citri Kuwayama (Hemiptera: Liviidae), is an important transmission vector of the citrus greening disease Candidatus Liberibacter asiaticus (CLas). The D. citri midgut exhibits an important tissue barrier against CLas infection. However, the molecular mechanism of the midgut response to CLas infection has not been comprehensively elucidated. In this study, we identified 778 differentially expressed genes (DEGs) in the midgut upon CLas infection, by comparative transcriptome analyses, including 499 upregulated DEGs and 279 downregulated DEGs. Functional annotation analysis showed that these DEGs were associated with ubiquitination, the immune response, the ribosome, endocytosis, the cytoskeleton and insecticide resistance. KEGG enrichment analysis revealed that most of the DEGs were primarily involved in endocytosis and the ribosome. A total of fourteen DEG functions were further validated by reverse transcription quantitative PCR (RT-qPCR). This study will contribute to our understanding of the molecular interaction between CLas and D. citri.Insects 2020, 11, 171 2 of 16 poisoning of farmers, environmental pollution and insect resistance [8,9]. Some researchers have focused on the olfactory system of D. citri, revealing a suite of odorants that can be used to develop affordable and safe odor-based surveillance for D. citri control [10]. Yu et al. revealed that the silencing of D. citri muscle protein 20 (DcMP20) resulted in significant mortality and reduced the body weight of D. citri [11]. By RNA interference (RNAi) technology, the knockdown of D. citri tropomyosin1-X1 (DcTm1-X1) significantly increased the mortality rate of nymphs [12]. Although some success regarding the control of D. citri has been achieved, the threats caused by HLB are going to continue. It is essential to investigate the molecular mechanisms of HLB transmission in D. citri.Both D. citri adults and nymphs can transmit CLas. Recent studies suggested that the pathogen multiplies in D. citri after acquisition and becomes distributed among various internal tissues, including the alimentary canal, salivary glands, hemolymph, filter chamber, midgut, fat body, muscle tissues and ovaries [13][14][15]. Among these tissues, the midgut is the first barrier that the bacterium must breach before entry into the hemolymph, indicating that the midgut plays an important role in CLas infection [16]. Pathogens can manipulate the host's essential biological processes during the host-pathogen interaction, e.g., by changing protein translation, vesicular transport and protein metabolism [17,18]. In the midgut, many genes and proteins are involved in the defense against pathogens. Wang et al. identified 869 differentially expressed genes (DEGs) in the Bombyx mori larval midgut via comparative transcriptome analysis. The results showed that many of the DEGs were associated with protein metabolism, the cytoskeleton and apoptosis [19]. Bao et al. performed a transcriptome-wide analysis on the Nilaparvata lugens intestine, an...

Trehalose-6-phosphate synthase (TPS) plays an important role in the synthesis of trehalose. In the current study, a TPS gene was obtained from Diaphorina citri, and named as DcTPS1 which encoded a protein of 833 amino acid residues. Real-time quantitative PCR (qPCR) analysis revealed that DcTPS1 had the highest expression level in the midgut and fifth-instar nymph stage. Knockdown of DcTPS1 by RNA interference (RNAi) induced an abnormal phenotype and increased mortality and malformation rate with a decreased molting rate. In addition, silencing of DcTPS1 significantly inhibited D. citri chitin metabolism and fatty acid metabolism, while the expression levels of fatty acid decomposition-related genes were downregulated. Furthermore, comparative transcriptomics analysis revealed that 791 differentially expressed genes (DEGs) were upregulated and 678 DEGs were downregulated when comparing dsDcTPS1 groups with dsGFP groups. Bioinformatics analysis showed that upregulated DEGs were mainly involved in oxidative phosphorylation, whereas downregulated DEGs were mainly attributed to the lysosome and ribosome. These results indicated that DcTPS1 played an important role in the growth and development of D. citri.