Establishment of immune homeostasis in insect vectors enabling persistent-propagative plant pathogen infection.

Abstract

Insect-borne plant pathogens pose a major threat to global agriculture and cause substantial economic losses. As natural vectors, insects display high tolerance to infection by plant pathogens, including viruses, bacteria, and phytoplasmas, while exhibiting no significant pathological effects. This suggests that they have evolved effective strategies to maintain immune homeostasis, thereby restricting pathogen infection to non-pathogenic levels. In this review, we summarize recent advances in understanding these immune mechanisms, including Toll, JAK-STAT, RNA interference, autophagy, apoptosis, and melanization. Future research may focus on identifying key pattern recognition receptors and developing innovative control strategies based on these immune mechanisms.