Dorith Rotenberg
Professor and Director of Graduate Programs - Plant Pathology
University Faculty Scholar
Bio
The overarching, long-range goal of my research is to diminish plant virus disease epidemics by generating and mining new knowledge derived from insect vector and virus genomes to develop specific and durable ‘green biotechnological’ breakthroughs to manage crop disease. Two plant-virus- vector systems are the focus of my projects: tomato-thrips- orthotospoviruses and maize-aphids- cereal viruses. The specific project goals are to determine how vector insects respond to plant virus infection, to identify novel anti-insect and anti-viral strategies for controlling virus diseases by targeting their gene products, and to help secure the food supply by informing and improving virus disease management decisions based on a more comprehensive understanding of virus epidemics and pathogen/vector dynamics.
Area(s) of Expertise
Ecology and molecular biology of plant virus-insect vector interactions
Publications
- CRISPR/Cas9-mediated genome editing of Frankliniella occidentalis, the western flower thrips, via embryonic microinjection , INSECT MOLECULAR BIOLOGY (2024)
- Dehydration and tomato spotted wilt virus infection combine to alter feeding and survival parameters for the western flower thrips, Frankliniella occidentalis , CURRENT RESEARCH IN INSECT SCIENCE (2024)
- A call to arms: novel strategies for thrips and tospovirus control , CURRENT OPINION IN INSECT SCIENCE (2023)
- Abaxial leaf surface-mounted multimodal wearable sensor for continuous plant physiology monitoring , SCIENCE ADVANCES (2023)
- Dehydration yields distinct transcriptional shifts associated with glycogen metabolism and increases feeding in the western flower thrips, Frankliniella occidentalis , ENTOMOLOGIA EXPERIMENTALIS ET APPLICATA (2023)
- First Report of Resistance-Breaking Variants of Tomato Spotted Wilt Virus (TSWV) Infecting Tomatoes with the Sw-5 Resistance Gene in North Carolina , PLANT DISEASE (2023)
- Multigenic Hairpin Transgenes in Tomato Confer Resistance to Multiple Orthotospoviruses Including Sw-5 Resistance-Breaking Tomato Spotted Wilt Virus , PHYTOPATHOLOGY (2023)
- Pests and resistance: The biology and control of supervectors and superpests , CURRENT OPINION IN INSECT SCIENCE (2023)
- Sex-biased proteomic response to tomato spotted wilt virus infection of the salivary glands of Frankliniella occidentalis, the western flower thrips , INSECT BIOCHEMISTRY AND MOLECULAR BIOLOGY (2022)
- The physical interactome between Peregrinus maidis proteins and the maize mosaic virus glycoprotein provides insights into the cellular biology of a rhabdovirus in the insect vector. , VIROLOGY (2022)