Infection by the microsporidium of clado Nosema/Vairimorpha in pupal parasitoids

Abstract

The sugarcane borer, Diatraea saccharalis is one of the hosts more used for parasitoid pupal multiplication in Brazil. The parasitoids pupal of Trichospilus diatraeae and Palmistichus elaeisis are generalist natural enemies with potential to suppress populations of diverse families of lepidopteran pests. The success in the utilization of these natural enemies in the field is directly related to the capacity of search of the host, this capacity might be affected by the presence of the pathogens. In this context, the aim of this essay was to detect the presence of intracellular parasites of Phylum Microsporidia. These pathogens may cause morphological and behavioral alterations. The presence of infection was verified by microscopy and was confirmed by amplification of region small subunit (SSU) of ribosomal RNA using universal primers for microsporidia of Nosema sp. The purified PCR products were submitted to sequencing, and the sequences that had been obtained were edited and aligned with the sequences in a Genbank database. In this way, it was possible to verify the presence of intracellular parasites in T. diatraeae, P. elaeisis and D. saccharalis pertaining to Clade Nosema/Vairimorpha. However, this is the first one report about detection of the microsporidia in the parasitoids T. diatraeae and P. elaeisis.