Genetic and phenotypic comparisons of viral genotypes from two nucleopolyhedroviruses interacting with a common host species, Spodoptera litura (Lepidoptera: Noctuidae)

Biological and genetic characterization of a Pakistani isolate of Spodoptera litura nucleopolyhedrovirus

“…Here we find that SpltNPV-Pak-BNG is fast acting compared to SpliNPV-G1. SpliNPV-G1 may originally have been found in S. litura, as this has also been the case in Japan as mixed infections with SpltNPV (Takatsuka et al, 2016). If our conclusion turns out to be correct, it may be advisable to use SpltNPV isolates to control S. litura rather than using SpliNPV isolates, because the former virus is fasteracting.…”

“…In addition, this information may render further support for the supposition that SpltNPV and SpliNPV are different baculovirus species, but within the same clade. In a previous study, SpltNPV and SpliNPV were isolated from S. litura in Japan (Takatsuka et al, 2016) and found that SpliNPV is more infectious and killed S. litura larvae faster than SpltNPV. Here we find that SpltNPV-Pak-BNG is fast acting compared to SpliNPV-G1.…”

“…Genetic analysis showed much large differences between the two virus isolates, for example, in the REN profile pattern. The REN pattern of SpltNPV-Pak-BNG corresponds to the REN patterns of SpltNPV-Type-B (Kamiya et al, 2004) and Japanese SpltNPVs (Takatsuka et al, 2003;Takatsuka, Okuno, Nakai, & Kunimi, 2016) on the basis of visual inspection of the REN digests. On the other hand, the SpltNPV-G1 REN profiles are very different from SpltNPV-Pak-BNG, but they appear closely related to SpltNPVType-A (Kamiya et al, 2004) and SpliNPV- AN-1956(Breitenbach et al, 2013.…”

“…Therefore, the SpltNPV isolate from the Darmstadt baculovirus depository should be renamed SpliNPV-G1 rather than SpltNPV-G1. It cannot be excluded, though, that the SpltNPV-G1 was isolated originally from S. littoralis, as Takatsuka et al (2016) also found a SpliNPV in a field isolate from Japan, which also contained a SpltNPV Sequencing of host DNA present in the Darmstadt SpltNPV-G1 sample should clarify this point (Rohrmann, 2014).…”

“…It has been shown that large genetic variation exists between SpltNPV and a SpliNPV field isolates (Kamiya et al, 2004;Takatsuka et al, 2003Takatsuka et al, , 2016 and that biological variation between isolates exists (Takatsuka et al, 2016). So, it is worthwhile to obtain further SpltNPV isolates Table 6.…”