- Sugar Research Australia, Queensland
Research Interests: Biology and Phylloxera
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Earlier this year Victorian Department of Environment and Primary Industries principal biosciences research scientist Kevin Powell, as one of the keynote presenters and member of the scientific advisory committee, attended the 6th... more
Earlier this year Victorian Department of Environment and Primary Industries principal biosciences research scientist Kevin Powell, as one of the keynote presenters and member of the scientific advisory committee, attended the 6th International Phylloxera Symposium in Bordeaux, France and provided this snapshot of work being done by researchers around the world on one of the greatest threats to vineyards.
Research Interests: Sociology and Phylloxera
What is phylloxera? Grape phylloxera, Daktulsphaira vitifoliae, is a devastating pest of grapevines worldwide, affecting Vitis species (commercial grapevines and ornamental vines). Phylloxera is an insect native to eastern North America,... more
What is phylloxera? Grape phylloxera, Daktulsphaira vitifoliae, is a devastating pest of grapevines worldwide, affecting Vitis species (commercial grapevines and ornamental vines). Phylloxera is an insect native to eastern North America, first affecting native European Vitis vinifera in the late 19th century. There have been several hundred documented strains of the pest worldwide, of which Australia is known to have 83 endemic strains (Umina et al. 2007; Powell and Korosi 2014). At present, these strains are confined to parts of Victoria and New South Wales.
Research Interests: History and Phylloxera
Trade-offs between reproduction and other energy-requiring activities are present in insects. However, feeding and reproduction are not often thought to be trade-offs, although in small insects space may be limiting for both ingestion of... more
Trade-offs between reproduction and other energy-requiring activities are present in insects. However, feeding and reproduction are not often thought to be trade-offs, although in small insects space may be limiting for both ingestion of food and egg development. This study characterised the structure of the digestive system of radicicolae Daktulosphaira vitifoliae (Hemiptera: Phylloxeridae) to investigate how feeding and egg development occur in this species. Using light and electron microscopy, the midgut of D. vitifoliae was observed to be composed of anterior and posterior regions, separated by a hindgut connection. The midgut is compressed during the development of parthenogenetically produced eggs in adults; individual eggs are ~30% of the adult length and in volume internally occupy 3–5% of the body cavity. The midgut posterior chamber is suggested to be essential for the continual supply of energy during periods of reduced food intake. The presence of the hindgut and an anal...
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ABSTRACT In Australia grapevine phylloxera is currently restricted to phylloxera infested zones (PIZs) located in NSW and Victoria. Despite the relative success of quarantine protocols and boundaries phylloxera remains a threat to an... more
ABSTRACT In Australia grapevine phylloxera is currently restricted to phylloxera infested zones (PIZs) located in NSW and Victoria. Despite the relative success of quarantine protocols and boundaries phylloxera remains a threat to an industry that is predominantly planted on susceptible ungrafted
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Background and Aims Frosted scale is a sap-sucking insect pest that feeds on several commercial Vitis vinifera cultivars across several wine regions of Australia. The ability to develop and the impact of its feeding activity on grapevines... more
Background and Aims Frosted scale is a sap-sucking insect pest that feeds on several commercial Vitis vinifera cultivars across several wine regions of Australia. The ability to develop and the impact of its feeding activity on grapevines have not been documented. We have closed this knowledge gap through a study that examined the development and feeding effect of frosted scale on Pinot Noir, Riesling and Sauvignon Blanc. Methods and Results A replicated glasshouse experiment was established by allocating the potted rootlings of the three cultivars into two treatment regimes, control (uninfested) and treated (infested with frosted scale) grapevines in the summer months between November 2011 and March 2012. Frosted scale population was relatively high on Riesling, moderate on Pinot Noir and least on Sauvignon Blanc. The presence of frosted scale significantly reduced leaf chlorophyll concentration and the number of internodes per vine. An increasing number of scales did not significantly affect the chlorophyll concentration in any cultivar. An increasing number of scales did significantly decrease the number of internodes per vine. The proportion of dropped leaves in all cultivars exposed to frosted scale was higher than that of control plants. Riesling dropped more leaves than Pinot Noir or Sauvignon Blanc. Conclusions An increase in first and second instar populations of frosted scale feeding mainly on grapevine leaves was observed. This feeding may reduce leaf chlorophyll and the number of internodes per vine. Pinot Noir, Riesling and Sauvignon Blanc were all susceptible to frosted scale feeding under glasshouse conditions, but individual cultivar performance varied. Significance of the Study Grapegrowers could expect frosted scale population and loss of vine vigour to increase on highly susceptible cultivars, such as Riesling. Further studies regarding cultivar differences in response to frosted scale feeding are necessary to clarify these results.
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ABSTRACT Background and Aims: Grape phylloxera, Daktulosphaira vitifoliae (Fitch), is a significant insect pest of grapevines and can cause mild to severe economic damage to ungrafted European grapevine, Vitis vinifera L., depending on... more
ABSTRACT Background and Aims: Grape phylloxera, Daktulosphaira vitifoliae (Fitch), is a significant insect pest of grapevines and can cause mild to severe economic damage to ungrafted European grapevine, Vitis vinifera L., depending on the insect clonal type. Dry heat treatment is currently recommended as a disinfestation method to restrict the spread of phylloxera to uninfested vineyards on viticultural machinery.Methods and Results: G1 and G4 first instar grape phylloxera clones were subjected to two relative humidity (30 and 100%) and four temperature (30, 35, 40 and 45°C) treatment combinations to find the optimal temperature–humidity combination to achieve 100% phylloxera mortality over the shortest time period.Conclusions: One hundred per cent mortality of two phylloxera clonal strains was achieved at 45°C for 75 min at 30% relative humidity. Some differences in clonal susceptibility to temperature and humidity treatments were observed.Significance of the Study: A novel screening method was developed, which validated the nationally recognised dry heat disinfestation protocol for grape phylloxera. The study also highlighted that different clonal lineages of phylloxera are influenced by both temperature and humidity.
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Sugarcane white leaf phytoplasma (white leaf disease) in sugarcane crops is caused by a phytoplasma transmitted by leafhopper vectors. White leaf disease (WLD) occurs predominantly in some Asian countries and is a devastating global... more
Sugarcane white leaf phytoplasma (white leaf disease) in sugarcane crops is caused by a phytoplasma transmitted by leafhopper vectors. White leaf disease (WLD) occurs predominantly in some Asian countries and is a devastating global threat to sugarcane industries, especially Sri Lanka. Therefore, a feasible and an effective approach to precisely monitoring WLD infection is important, especially at the early pre-visual stage. This work presents the first approach on the preliminary detection of sugarcane WLD by using high-resolution multispectral sensors mounted on small unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs) and supervised machine learning classifiers. The detection pipeline discussed in this paper was validated in a sugarcane field located in Gal-Oya Plantation, Hingurana, Sri Lanka. The pixelwise segmented samples were classified as ground, shadow, healthy plant, early symptom, and severe symptom. Four ML algorithms, namely XGBoost (XGB), random forest (RF), decision tree (DT), and K-nea...
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Research Interests: History and Phylloxera
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This letter describes how PROSPECT, updated with a 1 nm chlorophyll absorbance database, was used to infer total chlorophyll content from the measured reflectance spectra of grapevine leaves. Modelled and measured reflectance spectra... more
This letter describes how PROSPECT, updated with a 1 nm chlorophyll absorbance database, was used to infer total chlorophyll content from the measured reflectance spectra of grapevine leaves. Modelled and measured reflectance spectra agreed on average to within 13% over the range 400–1600 nm. However, discrepancies between modelled and measured reflectances of up to 40% were observed in the spectral region dominated
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Grape phylloxera, Daktulosphaira vitifoliae Fitch, is an important pest of grapevines (Vitis vinifera L.) (Vitaceae). The distribution and frequency of phylloxera clone lineages vary within infested regions of Australia, suggesting the... more
Grape phylloxera, Daktulosphaira vitifoliae Fitch, is an important pest of grapevines (Vitis vinifera L.) (Vitaceae). The distribution and frequency of phylloxera clone lineages vary within infested regions of Australia, suggesting the introduction of separate lineages of D. vitifoliae with host associations. Virulence levels of particular phylloxera clones may vary on V. vinifera, but much of this evidence is indirect. In this study, we directly tested the performance of phylloxera clones on V. vinifera using an established excised root assay and a new glasshouse vine assessment. In the root assay, grape phylloxera clones differed in egg production and egg to adult survivorship. In the vine assay, clones differed in the number of immature and adult life stages on roots. In addition vine characteristics, including mean stem weight, root weight, leaf chlorophyll and leaf area, were affected by different phylloxera clones. The two most widespread clones displayed high levels of virule...
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Canegrubs (Coleoptera: Scarabaeidae) are major pests of sugarcane crops in Australia, but despite long-term and intensive research, no commercially viable biological control agents have been identified. We used the RNA-Seq approach to... more
Canegrubs (Coleoptera: Scarabaeidae) are major pests of sugarcane crops in Australia, but despite long-term and intensive research, no commercially viable biological control agents have been identified. We used the RNA-Seq approach to explore the viriomes of three different species of canegrubs from central Queensland, Australia to identify potential candidates for biological control. We identified six novel RNA viruses, characterized their genomes, and inferred their evolutionary relationships with other closely related viruses. These novel viruses showed similarity to other known members from picornaviruses, benyviruses, sobemoviruses, totiviruses, and reoviruses. The abundance of viral reads varied in these libraries; for example, Dermolepida albohirtum picorna-like virus (9696 nt) was built from 83,894 assembled reads while only 1350 reads mapped to Lepidiota negatoria beny-like virus (6371 nt). Future studies are essential to determine their natural incidence in different life ...
Research Interests: Biology, Biodiversity, Medicine, Virus, Viruses, and 3 moreGenome, Scarabaeidae, and Biological Pest Control
Powell, K.S. & Yen, A.L. (2017) Temperate western Victorian grassland insects: the interactions between native and exotic insects and plants. In Invertebrate Ecology of Australasian Grasslands. Proceedings of the Ninth ACGIE (ed S.N.... more
Powell, K.S. & Yen, A.L. (2017) Temperate western Victorian grassland insects: the interactions between native and exotic insects and plants. In Invertebrate Ecology of Australasian Grasslands. Proceedings of the Ninth ACGIE (ed S.N. Johnson), pp. 18-21. Western Sydney University, Hawkesbury, NSW, Australia.
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Powell, K.S. (2017) Improving the management of red headed cockchafer in ryegrass pastures through improved surveillance techniques. In Invertebrate Ecology of Australasian Grasslands. Proceedings of the Ninth ACGIE (ed S.N. Johnson), pp.... more
Powell, K.S. (2017) Improving the management of red headed cockchafer in ryegrass pastures through improved surveillance techniques. In Invertebrate Ecology of Australasian Grasslands. Proceedings of the Ninth ACGIE (ed S.N. Johnson), pp. 86-89. Western Sydney University, Hawkesbury, NSW, Australia.
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Page 42. Chapter 3 Insecticidal Properties of Plant Lectins: Their Potential in Plant Protection Angharad MR Gatehouse, Kevin S. Powell, Willy J. Peumans, Els JM Van Damme and John A. Gatehouse Role of lectins in plant ...
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Researchers have developed a novel remote sensing system using unmanned aerial vehicles, or drones, to maximise the accuracy and efficiency of monitoring efforts for detecting grape phylloxera pest infestations in vineyards.
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... Proc. 5th International Phylloxera Symposium Eds.: M. Griesser and A. Forneck Acta Hort. 904, ISHS 2011 Page 2. 54 ... helleri '7651') and Merbein 6262 (V. cinerea 'Barrett 58' × V.... more
... Proc. 5th International Phylloxera Symposium Eds.: M. Griesser and A. Forneck Acta Hort. 904, ISHS 2011 Page 2. 54 ... helleri '7651') and Merbein 6262 (V. cinerea 'Barrett 58' × V. cinerea 'Barrett 194-1') from the CSIRO rootstock breeding program (Jones et al., 2009). ...
Research Interests: Horticulture, Biology, Viticulture, Hybrid, Phylloxera, and 3 moreRootstock, V, and Horticultural production
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ABSTRACT Radicolae grape phylloxera feed on the roots of grapevines and the first instar life-stage can be found during the spring and summer above-ground on the soil surface or in the grapevine canopy and on ripening fruit. Therefore... more
ABSTRACT Radicolae grape phylloxera feed on the roots of grapevines and the first instar life-stage can be found during the spring and summer above-ground on the soil surface or in the grapevine canopy and on ripening fruit. Therefore there is a significant risk of phylloxera transfer, if infested machinery or grape products are not effectively disinfested prior to removal from an infested vineyard. In Australia 80% of vineyards are planted on non-resistant ungrafted Vitis vinifera L., hence the introduction of the pest into these vineyards could have economic consequences for the industry. To protect uninfested regions quarantine restrictions exist for the movement of machinery and winery waste from phylloxera-infested regions. Temperature and humidity is known to be one of the factors, which can impact on phylloxera survival and development. In order to validate the effectiveness of quarantine protocols for heat treatment of machinery and winery waste products (grape pomace or marc) trials were conducted under controlled laboratory, and commercial winery, conditions. Preliminary data on survival of phylloxera under these conditions are described.
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ABSTRACT Feeding by the radicicolae form of grape phylloxera (Daktulosphaira vitifoliae) leads to gall development and root decay on Vitis vinifera and may cause economic damage for the vineyard. This damage is managed by planting V.... more
ABSTRACT Feeding by the radicicolae form of grape phylloxera (Daktulosphaira vitifoliae) leads to gall development and root decay on Vitis vinifera and may cause economic damage for the vineyard. This damage is managed by planting V. vinifera grafted to resistant rootstocks. The processes of grape phylloxera feeding and the mechanisms of rootstock resistance can be investigated with the application of the Electrical Penetration Graph (EPG) technique. EPG technology has been applied to investigate the feeding behaviour of aphids for over 40 years, but has not previously been reported on grape phylloxera. Deterrents for the application of EPG technology to grape phylloxera included the relative small size of the insect, the root-feeding habit and a lack of correlation studies involving non-vascular feeding insects. Here we report that EPG has successfully been applied to study the feeding behaviour of radicicolae grape phylloxera. EPG recordings have been obtained from both excised root and tissue culture plant recording systems, and from first instar to adult life stages of the insect. Feeding patterns have been recorded for up to eight hours and a number of EPG waveforms have been identified. To determine signature-feeding waveforms, initial studies involved recording insects in an active feeding position. In order to establish an understanding of the complete feeding behaviour of grape phylloxera (including stylet penetration and pathway to ingestion), insects in the probe initiation position were disrupted from feeding and relocated onto a new food source. Disturbed insects successfully re-established feeding.