​Plants produce a plethora of secondary metabolites to defend against their insect herbivores. Herbivores detoxify or rapidly excrete these chemicals to escape their ill effects. However, these mechanisms may not be exclusively beneficial. The upper trophic level organisms (predators and parasitoids) that consume these herbivores are sometimes susceptible to these compounds. Due to effective detoxification or rapid excretion, herbivores reduce the toxin content of their body which eventually renders them susceptible to their natural enemies. Conversely, some herbivores co-opt plant defenses without metabolizing them and use them as their own defenses against natural enemies. Molecular and biochemical processes underlying them remain uncovered.
​
Our primary focus is on revealing the effect of the key factor of these interactions, herbivore’s counter-adaptation against plant defense, using the integration of modern transcriptomics, proteomics and metabolomics approaches with the classical field ecology-based methods. We study various crop-based multitrophic interaction systems with the aim to enhance the biological control of insect pests.
Highlights
News and Updates
Gauri Binayak and Manish Kumar defended their Ph.D. theses on 17.10.23 and 19.10.23 respectively.
​
Manish Kumar has been elected to the Early-career Members Network (EMN) Committee of the Metabolomics Society. (Link1, Link 2)
​
Gauri Binayak was awarded the "Best Student Presentation Award" at the 38th Annual Conference of the International Society of Chemical Ecology (ISCE 2023) held at IISc Bangalore.
​
Manish Kumar received an International Travel Support (ITS) grant from SERB to attend the "19th Annual Conference of the Metabolomics Society- METABOLOMICS 2023" to be held at Niagara Falls, Canada.
​
Manish Kumar has been selected by the Early-career Members Network (EMN) committee of the Metabolomics Society as one of three winners in the Doctoral Student category of the "Metabolomics Society Early Career Travel Awards" for an oral presentation at the "19th Annual Conference of the Metabolomics Society- METABOLOMICS 2023". (Link)
​
Rutwik Bardapurkar received the DBT-CTEP travel award for attending the 79th Katzir Conference "Noncoding RNAs in Development & Cell Differentiation" at Weizmann Institute, Israel.
​
Gauri Binayak's popular science story won the BEST STORY award in the Augmenting Writing Skills for Articulating Research (AWSAR) Programme.
​
Gauri Binayak received the Eklavya-Ignite travel award and the DBT-CTEP travel award for attending the Gordon Research Conference and Seminar, Plant-Herbivore Interactions, in California, USA.
​
Gauri Binayak was selected as one of the only two student speakers at the Gordon Research Conference and Seminar, Plant-Herbivore Interactions, in California, USA.
Rituparna Ghosh joins (March 2023) as a postdoc in INRAE, Institut de Génétique, Environnement et Protection des Plantes, France.
​
Rituparna Ghosh defended her Ph.D. thesis on 25.05.23.
​
Dr. Sagar Pandit has been selected as a DAAD Research Ambassador.
​
Manish Kumar has been awarded with the "ISCE-Bedoukian Applied Semiochemical Research Travel Award" by the International Society of Chemical Ecology (ISCE) for the "Third Joint Meeting of ISCE and APACE" at Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia (August 2022).
​
Dr. Sagar Pandit has been elected as a Fellow of the Royal Entomological Society, UK.
​
Dr. Sagar Pandit has been elected as a Fellow of The Entomological Society of India.
​
Recent Publications
D. M. Firake, K. C. Naga, V. S. Raju Dantuluri, Y. S. Wagh, P. Naveen Kumar, K. V. Prasad, P. Prasanth, S. Tadigiri, J. J. Rajappa, D. Vasanthakumar, R. S. Yadav, K. S. Girish and Sagar Pandit (2024) Blossom midge Contarinia maculipennis Felt infesting tuberose (Agave amica) flowers in India. CURRENT SCIENCE, VOL. 126, NO. 2.
https://www.currentscience.ac.in/Volumes/126/02/0263.pdf
Ghosh R., Metze D., Sant S., Shaikh M., Deshpande A., Firake D. M., Pandit S*. (2023). Chemical ecology of Himalayan eggplant variety's antixenosis: Identification of geraniol as an oviposition deterrent against the eggplant shoot and fruit borer. New Phytologist. https://doi.org/10.1111/nph.18877
​
Firake D. M., Ghosh R., Kumar M., Milton A. A. P., Sanjukta R., Behere G. T., Pandit S*. (2022). Bioactivity of Zanthoxylum armatum fruit extracts against Spodoptera frugiperda and Tuta absoluta. Journal of Plant Diseases and Protection.
https://doi.org/10.1007/s41348-022-00652-1
​
Shaikh M., Bahulikar R., Chitnis A., and Pandit S.* (2022). GA3-mediated reforestation pioneering mechanism of actinorhizal Elaeagnus conferta Roxb. in the slashed and burnt shifting cultivation lands in India’s megadiversity hotspot. Restoration Ecology, e13705. https://doi.org/10.1111/rec.13705
​
Umesh K. P., Pandey P. P., Kumar M., & Pandit S. S.* (2021). An untapped plant defense: Eggplant’s steroidal glycoalkaloid solasonine confers deterrence against the Oriental leafworm Spodoptera litura. Entomologia Generalis, 42(1), 101–116. https://doi.org/10.1127/entomologia/2021/1213
​
Mitra S., Firake D. M., Umesh K. P., Pandey P. P., & Pandit S*. (2021). Polyphagous caterpillars of Spodoptera litura switch from a trap crop to the main crop, improve fitness, and shorten generation time. Journal of Pest Science, 1-13.
https://doi.org/10.1007/s10340-021-01351-w
