Background

Mountain pine beetle are native of pine forest in western North America. They are found from the Pacific coast east to the inner lands of Alberta (Figure 2) (Ken Gibson et al. 2009).

According to Ken Gibson et al., MPB's females are the colonizer of the host pine trees (typically Lodgepole pine). Once they are able to create a hole in the phloem of the tree, they use pheromones to attract males, but only one male is able to succeed; the dynamic combination of pheromones also results in attacks on adjacent live trees, producing group of dead trees across a landscape.

One of this main host pine trees of MPB is with the native conifer Lodgepole pine (Pinus contorta). This have been extensively studied due to the economic and ecological significance of these plants and the losses these insects cause to the boreal forests during outbreaks.

(Agbulu, V. et al. 2021; Erbilgin, N. et al. 2003).

Beetle’s killing ability is facilitated by mass attacks via the production of aggregation pheromones and by infection of host phloematic tissues with symbiotic fungi during host colonization and aggregation (Erbilgin, N. et al. 2003). The beetles have a mutualistic interaction with pathogenic fungi as these fungi benefit beetles by overwhelming tree defenses and possibly detoxifying and metabolizing defenses' chemicals (terpen), while the fungi are able to spread and colonize new hosts trees.

Three species of fungi are associated with Mountain Pine Beetle causing "blue-stain color" in pine wood: Grosmannia clavigera (Robinson- Jeffery and Davidson) Ophiostoma montium (Rumbold) and Leptographium longiclavatum (Lee, Kim, and Breuil ).( Rice, A. V., et al. 2007)

Research objectives

The idea of the entire project is to clarify all the interactions between the Lodgepole pine tree and Mountain Pine beetle-symbiotic fungi.

This research is focused on the chemical interaction between symbiotic fungi and host tree. In particular, how the chemical defences of the tree change in presence of these symbiotic fungi.

Based on the samples collected from the Lodgepole pine with inoculation of symbiotic fungi these two main questions arise:

1.Are there differences in chemical defenses of pine trees between fungal inoculations and control?

2.Are there differences in chemical defenses of pine trees inoculated by three fungal species?

Expected results

According to the relevant chemical-entomological knowledge from European species, I expect a differences between treatments and control in concentration and possibly also in specific different concentration within each chemical produce by Lodgepole pine in presence of different fungi. There is also high probability that in presence of G. clavigera, that is the most pathogenetic symbiotic fungi related with MPB (Plattner A. et al. 2008), the lodgepole pine tree would respond with an increase in concentration of terpen, whereas in presence of L.longiclavatum and O. montium, would be less amount of concentration. The main question is which chemical will be less or more concentrated after inoculation of the symbiotic fungi.