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Wheat Germ Hemicellulose Is an Absolute Requirement for Growth and Development of the Southwestern Corn Borer^1,2,3,4,

Crop Science Research Laboratory, USDA-ARS, Mississippi State, MS 39762

The southwestern corn borer, Diatraea grandiosella Dyar, is a major pest of corn, Zea mays L., in the southern United States. To search for plant allelochemicals, chemically defined insect diets are commonly used, but southwestern corn borer larvae did not grow and develop unless a subnutritional amount of wheat germ was incorporated in the amino acid diet. Fractionation led to identification of hemicellulose as the active component which was then characterized. The hemicellulose permitted insect growth on a protein-free amino acid diet. Microfloral involvement was ruled out because larvae grew and developed free of intestinal microbes. Therefore, this insect has an absolute requirement for hemicellulose that has evidently not been demonstrated with other invertebrates or vertebrates. This finding is of general interest because hitherto, the contributions of hemicellulose to nutrition have generally been considered to be associated chiefly with microfloral conversion to assimilable carbohydrates. Investigations should be conducted to determine whether hemicelluloses are also important or essential for growth of vertebrates including mammals by mechanisms that may not have been considered.

KEY WORDS: • southwestern corn borer • hemicellulose • Diatraea grandiosella

¹ Glycosyl analyses supported in part by funds from the Department of Energy (DE-FG05-93ER20097), Center for Plant and Microbial Complex Carbohydrates, Athens, GA.

² Presented in part at the 206th National Meeting of the American Chemical Society, Division of Agrochemicals, August 22–26, 1993, Chicago, IL [Hedin, P. A., Davis, F. M., Callahan, F. E., & Dollar, D. A. (1993) Identification and chemical characterization of the hemicellulose from wheat germ as an essential nutrient for growth of the southwestern corn borer (abs. 107)].

³ Mention of a trademark, proprietary product or vendor does not constitute a guarantee or warranty of the product by the U.S. Department of Agriculture and does not imply its approval to the exclusion of other products or vendors that may also be suitable.

⁴ The costs of publication of this article were defrayed in part by the payment of page charges. This article must therefore be hereby marked "advertisement" in accordance with 18 USC section 1734 solely to indicate this fact.

⁵ To whom correspondence should be addressed.

Manuscript received 24 January 1994. Revision accepted 23 May 1994.