Correction to:Molecular characterization and functional analysis of daf-8 in the pinewood nematode,Bursaphelenchus xylophilus

Correction to:J.For.Res.(2022)33:689–698 https://doi.org/10.1007/s11676-021-01335-7 In the Original Publication,the text“Acknowledgements sdfkjds”has been inadvertently appeared in the paper.The Original article has been corrected.

Molecular characterization and functional analysis of daf-8 in the pinewood nematode,Bursaphelenchus xylophilus

Bursaphelenchus xylophilus,causal agent of pine wilt disease,causes extensive damage worldwide.Strate-gies are needed to inhibit population growth or block the spread of the invasive nematode to control pine wilt dis-ease.The gene daf-8 plays crucial roles in larval develop-ment and dauer formation in Caenorhabditis elegans,but little is known about its orthologue in B.xylophilus.In the present molecular characterization and functional analysis of daf-8 in B.xylophilus(Bx-daf-8),RT-qPCR showed that the expression of Bx-daf-8 gradually increased during the embryonic stage,peaked in the second-stage juvenile(J2),then dramatically dropped in the J3,and remained at that low level for the rest of its life.Bx-daf-8-transgenic C.elegans was employed to mimic the spatiotemporal expression of Bx-daf-8,which was expressed close to the pharynx during early embryogenesis and weakly throughout the whole body during late embryogenesis.It was observed in head neurons and tail ganglions throughout all postembryonic stages.B.xylophilus embryos were severely abnormal,and hatching rate decreased sharply after Bx-daf-8 knockdown.daf-16-1 and da-f16-2,downstream genes in the IIS pathway,also dropped sharply after Bx-daf-8 knockdown.We propose that TGFβmay crosstalk with the IIS pathway upstream of Bx-daf-16 and that daf-8 may act as a master regulator of daf-16 in B.xylophilus.However,knockdown of Bx-daf-8 did not lead to constitutive developmental arrest at the dauer larval stage,indicating that dauer entry in B.xylophilus might be controlled by several genes and is more complicated than in C.elegans.Bx-daf-8 alone did not control the dauer entry in B.xylophilus,but it was indispensable for embryogen-esis,providing a potential target for suppressing population growth of B.xylophilus.

Mating and reproductive characteristics of the pathogenic nematode Bursaphelenchus xylophilus

Pine wood nematode(B ursaphelenchus xylophilus),one of the most destructive invasive species,has caused extremely serious economic,ecological and social losses in many countries throughout the world.Since the high reproductive rate of B.xylophilus PWN is the main cause of rapid death of its pine hosts(Pinus spp.),understanding the reproductive and population biology and the ecology of this nmatode are of great importance.This study mainly focused on analyzing the mating process and population structure under different combinations of sex ratios for mating.Reproductive efficiency of B.xylophilus peaked when the sex ratio(female to male)was 3.4:1.Phases of the mating process for the different sex-ratio combinations indicated that B.xylophilus had evolved alternative reproductive strategies to cope with complex copulating conditions to obtain a suitable population structure for further propagation.This research provides fundamental information on the mechanism that is responsible for the rapid population growth of B.xylophilus.