Aphid Attraction and Preference for Soybean and Pepper Plants Infected with Potyviridae

The progress of nonpersistently transmitted virus epidemics can be substantially altered by the degree of aphid attraction and preference for virus-infected plants. Our objective was to determine whether color or odor-mediated cues of plants infected with Potyviridae mediate aphid attraction. We found that Myzus persicae (Sulzer) and Rhopalosiphum maidis (Fitch) preferred alighting on intensely (highly saturated) yellow than on green (plant-like) or brown (soil-like) ceramic tiles, and expressed no preference for landing on leaves infected with soybean mosaic virus (SMV) or on chlorophyll-deficient soybean leaves. Furthermore, neither aphid species showed odor-mediated attraction to leaf extracts of SMV-infected leaves. Also, R. maidis remained longer on uninfected than on SMV-infected soybean plants before taking flight, although M. periscae exhibited no preference. Neither aphid species had a preference to remain on healthy or potato virus Y-infected plants. Therefore, we conclude that both aphid species when landing are equally likely to alight on healthy or SMV-infected soybean plants in the field, but R. maidis is likely to remain a shorter time on SMV-infected than on healthy plants before taking off. The fact that aphids leave the infected plant soon after probing increases the probability of finding another plant and making an infective probe before the vector loses its potential to inoculate the virus. These results could be used to increase the precision of existing simulations models, such as the one previously developed for SMV.