Document Type
Article
Publication Title
Frontiers in Microbiology
Publication Date
Fall 11-30-2021
Keywords
reared crickets, insects as food and feed, Gryllodes sigillatus, cricket viruses, entomopathogenic viruses
Abstract
Interest in developing food, feed, and other useful products from farmed insects has gained remarkable momentum in the past decade. Crickets are an especially popular group of farmed insects due to their nutritional quality, ease of rearing, and utility. However, production of crickets as an emerging commodity has been severely impacted by entomopathogenic infections, about which we know little. Here, we identified and characterized an unknown entomopathogen causing mass mortality in a lab-reared population of Gryllodes sigillatus crickets, a species used as an alternative to the popular Acheta domesticus due to its claimed tolerance to prevalent entomopathogenic viruses. Microdissection of sick and healthy crickets coupled with metagenomics-based identification and real-time qPCR viral quantification indicated high levels of cricket iridovirus (CrIV) in a symptomatic population, and evidence of covert CrIV infections in a healthy population. Our study also identified covert infections of Acheta domesticus densovirus (AdDNV) in both populations of G. sigillatus. These results add to the foundational research needed to better understand the pathology of mass-reared insects and ultimately develop the prevention, mitigation, and intervention strategies needed for economical production of insects as a commodity.
Funding Source
This research was supported in part by the U.S. Department of Agriculture, Agricultural Research Service. SS and BS were supported by a grant from the National Science Foundation (IOS 16–54028). JH was supported by a grant from the Australian Research Council (DP180101708). Mention of trade names or commercial products in this publication is solely for the purpose of providing specific information and does not imply recommendation or endorsement by the U.S. Department of Agriculture. USDA is an equal opportunity provider and employer.
Recommended Citation
Duffield KR, Hunt J, Sadd BM, Sakaluk SK, Oppert B, Rosario K, Behle RW and Ramirez JL (2021) Active and Covert Infections of Cricket Iridovirus and Acheta domesticus Densovirus in Reared Gryllodes sigillatus Crickets. Front. Microbiol. 12:780796. doi: 10.3389/fmicb.2021.780796
DOI
10.3389/fmicb.2021.780796
Comments
First published in Frontiers in Microbiology (2021): https://doi.org/10.3389/fmicb.2021.780796
This is an open access article under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License, which permits use, distribution and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited.
Supplemental Data: https://www.frontiersin.org/articles/10.3389/fmicb.2021.780796/full#supplementary-material