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Updated: Oct 27, 2026

Isolation, Behavioral Identification, and Pathogenicity Assessment of Entomopathogenic Fungi from a Forest Wood Borer
Published on: September 29, 2023
Frenemies forever: when parasitic fungi become an insect's secret weapon
Robin Wendrix1,2, Silvia Coolen1
1Translational Plant Biology, Faculty of Science, Utrecht University, P.O. Box 800.56, 3508 TB, Utrecht, the Netherlands.
Abstract:
Plant-feeding insects pose a major threat to global food production, and finding sustainable pest control strategies is challenging. Insect-associated symbiotic microorganisms fulfill important beneficial functions for their host insects, enabling them to adapt and thrive in a changing environment. Understanding how these interactions evolve and what they mean for insect-plant interactions is key to the development of novel targets and potential tools for pest control. Since yeast and fungal insect symbionts are understudied in comparison to bacterial symbionts, this Tansley Insight explores their role in insect-plant interactions.
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