Fig 1.
Selective process adopted to isolate thermotolerant Beauveria bassiana.
(A) Collection of infected insects and soil samples from hot areas. (B) Isolation and morphological identification of the obtained isolates. (C) Biological traits tested at different temperatures (20°C, 25°C, 30°C and 35°C). (D) Selection of the best isolates in performance and entomopathogenicity evaluation at 30°C. (E) Molecular identification of the most aggressive isolates.
Fig 2.
Geographical location of the area where the samples were collected.
The inset shows the sampling sites distribution within the Syrian borders, the origin of the sample (soil or infected insects) and the code of the isolates. Maps were plotted by using the function map in the R package “maps” [28].
Fig 3.
The collected insects infested by Beauveria bassiana, with the degrees of FDI on Ephestia kuehienella larvae.
(a) infected larva of Ephestia kuehniella in soil trap method; (b) Phyllognathus excavatus adult (♀) infected with Beauveria bassiana; (c) Bombyx mori larva infected with B. bassiana; (d) Paropta paradoxa larva infected with B. bassiana; (e) Germination of B. bassiana spores; (f) Healthy larvae of E. kuehienella (3rd instar); (g) larva of E. kuehienella with milanic spots (FDI = 0.5); (h) dead larva of E. kuehienella covered with mycelium growth (FDI = 2); (i) larva of E. kuehienella covered with B. bassiana growth in full sporulation (FDI = 3).
Table 1.
Mortality of the larvae and fungal development index at the 10th day of treatment.
Table 2.
Aggressivity assessment of selected isolates of Beauveria bassiana.
Fig 4.
Bayesian consensus tree inferred on ITS, Bloc and EF1-α gene sequences.
Support values expressed as Bayesian posterior probability are reported above the nodes, while below each nodes the approximate likelihood ratio test (as obtained in the Maximum Likelihood phylogenetic inference analysis performed on the same dataset) are recorded. Outgroups: Beauveria sp. and Beauveria brongniartii. The scale bar at the bottom indicates the distance expressed in substitutions per site. Isolates obtained in this study are surrounded by black lines.