Killing crop-damaging insects by targeting genes essential to their survival is a promising approach to pest control.

 

It is obvious that, essential genes are often conserved across multiple insect species, the challenge is finding targets whose silencing kills the pests but not beneficial insects.

Led by Georg Jander, a professor at the Boyce Thompson Institute (BTI), a team of researchers have demonstrated that horizontally transferred genes (HTGs)  genes transmitted from one species to another , found in insect genomes are valid targets for selectively killing green peach aphids (Myzus persicae), whiteflies (Bemisia tabaci) and potentially other insects that cause major damage to food crops worldwide.